On the Subject of Planets

[Ithirahad]

Oh... That sounds complicated to implement, and glitchy...(Particularly the transitions between planetary positioning and galactic/universal positioning; IDK how to make those smooth) I was envisioning a MASSIVE globe of rectangular segments, hopefully large enough that the "awkward gap" (overlap) would become negligible, even a chunk below the surface. A circular polecap would exist on both sides, with perhaps its own unique ice biome.

 

[Valiant70]

That's also a possibility. One thing that needs to happen is allowing players to place blocks that overlap the other plates. I can't make the underground grav-tube network I want to on the dodecahedrons because I can't place blocks that overlap other plates.

 

[NeonSturm]

That's also a possibility. One thing that needs to happen is allowing players to place blocks that overlap the other plates. I can't make the underground grav-tube network I want to on the dodecahedrons because I can't place blocks that overlap other plates.

The problem I have with planets (I guess current StarMade in general) is that you are forced to add 1m details where you don't need details but are not allowed for 0.5m details where you want them.​

Maybe you think this is trivial, but please continue reading:

The real earth has 40'000 Km perimeter.
But humans don't know every inch of it.

Somewhere you can't walk by foot in <1 minute.

You can fly through canyons, build a (100m)^3 underground base...​

There don't need to be _saved_ blocks everywhere.

Only player-placed "patches" of generated chunks.

Players should be able to place huge ammounts of rocks or other non-functional (non-logic, non-door, ...) parts as "repeated patterns" between point A and B as a patch of naturally generated areas.

The system then only needs to link the structure to chunks and has some degree of freedom optimizing it for performance (avoid other existing player-patched chunks, ...)

A high-map and some generator-inputs + Level Of Detail
Locally 2 or 3 (deep+high)tuple-maps can render floating parts. while they aren't loaded as blocks.​

I hope that in StarMade's future

1. planets and huge floating connected asteroids are compressed in hard-disk-size through natural events like earth-quakes and meteor-showers.
2. Level-Of-Detail implementions allow near infinite block counts on stationary objects.
3. Loading chunks is optimized for nearest-chunks and LOD.

 

[Dman1791]

I think I'll add my thoughts to this discussion.

I absolutely HATE the current planets. The gravity well is extremely small, segment transitions are strange, and there are very noticeable cracks between segments. I have a few ideas on how to make planets better. I have taken a few things from what others have suggested here (Mainly Ithirahad and Valiant70) and added my own things to them.

Spoiler: TL;DR: Bigger planets, more optimization, atmospheres, reduced quirkiness

1. Planets should be MUCH larger, and have variable size, to encourage exploration and planetary excursions. Their gravity well should extend quite far, as well. They should also be much rarer, say, 2-8 per star. Larger planets shoud have stronger gravity.

2. Planets should have an atmosphere that is larger on the larger planets. The atmosphere reduces max speed relative to mass, down to a minimum of, say, ~25% server max speed. Every 1 mass reduces atmospheric speed by 0.1, meaning that ships of 750 mass in a 100 speed server would go 25 in a planet's atmosphere. This encourages ships made for atmospheric flight and reduces the effects of a huge ship crashing into the surface. There could also be a jet propulsion system for purely atmospheric craft. It would offer a little extra thrust but only work in an atmosphere. Weapons should have ~50% range in atmosphere, excluding missiles. Weapons should not be able to fire from the vacuum into an atmosphere, preventing problems from hitting unloaded areas. You COULD, however, fire from the atmosphere into the vacuum, which gives planetary bases an advantage over stations, except that planets should not be able to be shielded due to their size and makeup. This would make planets even more useful and encourage colonization.

3. Planets need to be different from the current ones. While the current system is cool, it just doesn't work well. With the 1st suggestion implemented, there would be smaller gaps. These gaps could have a simple texture extending from one block to another to give the illusion that there aren't gaps. Transitions between different segments could be better handled by simply keeping track of the astronaut's view by degrees, such as looking above an artificial horizon by 23 degrees and deviating from a hardcoded linear standard by 51 degrees. By linear standard, I mean a 0 degree mark that is used as a base for determining left/right looking. This would remain the same no matter how the gravity on your character changes, stopping the awkward view rotations from gravity shifts.

4. Instead of displaying every segment on the nav, just display the planet's center. This is just to reduce nav clutter since there would be a lot more segments. Perhaps add a planets segment checkbox to the nav.

5. Only the segment you are on and the ones surrounding it are loaded so that you don't have the entire planet taxing the client.
6. Everything beyond the loaded segments becomes a texture that uses every 4x4 or 16x16 or whatever square of blocks and uses the most common block to generate a pixel for display. There could be a graphics option for the planet's display pixels, so that they could be a rougher display to reduce required system reources.

6. Poles should always be icy. Planet distance from the star of the system could determine the likelyhood of planet types spawning, so that we could have icy outer planets and rocky, sun-baked inner ones.

7. Ores should spawn more frequently near the core and less frequently near the surface. Caves would be nice, but aren't all that great for a space based game. There should be ores that can only be found on planets.

 

[aceface]

I think every Starmade player has at least one problem with the current planets, be that that they cause too much lag, are ugly, or any other obscure reason. Obviously they are a major WIP, just like many other features in the game, which is why I am making this suggestion.

I recently tried a pre-alpha game called "Seed of Andromeda", which is more or less trying to recreate the Minecraft experience on a circular planet. I think the system employed in this game could solve several of the problems of Starmade planets if a similar system were adopted.

The planets in this game are FULL SCALE, meaning that they are often in excess of 10,000 kilometers in diameter. The only way this is accomplished in a voxel game is to not have the whole thing loaded at once (obviously). However, the key feature here is that the parts that are not drawn by voxels, but instead by 3D mapping (I think that is the proper term) See attached pic for what I mean

I think a system like this could be used to make Starmade planets a viable location again. Perhaps we may even be able to have 1km diameter or more planets.View attachment 4433

Schema himself said on reddit that he saw this and didn't want to use it due to the sheer amount of blocks having to be used. If a block is loaded it takes up a certain amount of memory and if many planets in the universe are loaded one after another (unlike this game) then you would need a crazy amount of ram.

One thing I think however that should not be ignored it this 3d mapping feature. The planets could be maybe doubled in size, not 1:1 scale planet. I to hate planets for one simple reason - they are laggy. If I were to use say 1000 max draw segments I can render just about a planet piece. But if I am far away from the planet it looks wierd to have to look at the planet core. So instead - the rest of the planet is rendered as this 3d mapping thing so you can see the whole planets like they are now without lag!

 

[WaffulMann]

there is just one good reason why not,it would kill the economy in the future,that big planets would have sooooo many ores and materials,and with infinite planets in the universe,that is even worse.
i like it how they are right now

Old comment, old reply but still here goes.
I really don't think, no matter how advanced a civilization is, one should be able to completely mine out a planet. Giant mega planets in my book is a good idea BECAUSE of the many ores possibility. It would actually increase competition over mineral-rich worlds.
And just separate salvage from mining, and make mining slower, that should take care of most of the problems.

Just a thought though.

Remember, seed of Andromeda is a space voxel game too, and if they can do it I can't see why starmade can't. All in all, +1 support. Has schema seen this yet? I would like to hear his thoughts.

 

[NeonSturm]

Schema himself said on reddit that he saw this and didn't want to use it due to the sheer amount of blocks having to be used. If a block is loaded it takes up a certain amount of memory and if many planets in the universe are loaded one after another (unlike this game) then you would need a crazy amount of ram.

There has to be an intelligent way to solve this issue. The game does not have to remember everything.

1. Chunks : could have 2-4 possible "patches" which are a set of blocks in a repeated pattern (basically an instruction to render a tunnel).

because the parameters for this generator remain the same, it will be the same again and again - no blocks need to be saved.​

2. Nature : abuse it for more efficiency!

eruptions, plants spreading... not every change has to be permanent (saved chunks could be referenced in an expiration task-list which removes modifications and resets to the parameter-generated terrain).

Especially planets with config("long days") near suns will expire sooner.

Make a fast generation script and only save things that the user will remember + keep parameters or derive them from the planet position.​

3. Effort :

If a player puts effort into protecting something (a shielded base, shields share around the settlement perimeter?) it can be saved. A player spent time to earn the memorial of this!​

 

[blurb357]

This its the video:


Seriously, at some stage Starmade must to have planets that appear planets not planetoids.

schema has commented about this and said that this would be incredibly hard to implement and would cause more lag, as there would not be just one planet but hundreds[DOUBLEPOST=1411232767,1411232505][/DOUBLEPOST]I have an Idea, it might be laggy, i dont know, on earth each person is attracted to the center of the earth, so why aren't the physics of gravity and the earth implemented into the game?

 

[Valiant70]

I think the best course of action in the case of a planet overhaul is going to be some combination of the many ideas displayed here.
This would require a lot of work and coding and take a long time to implement, but in my opinion it would be worth it. Planets really seem like an underused feature right now, and making them this amazing would cure that in a flash.

1. Increased realism of having far larger and far, far rarer planets (as few as three in a star system, and fewer star systems).
ADVANTAGE: Reasonable level of realism and makes planets more valuable.

2. Seed-based fast-generation to save data and save only chunks that a player has added blocks to. Generate ONLY the surface chunks unless something lands or the surface is disturbed by something like weapons fire or mining beams.
ADVANTAGES:

• Will not use much save data - in fact it may use less than the current system which generates entire planets and saves them!
• Ore is replenished when the area regenerates. This could be refined to delete/regenerate abandoned areas after all manmade blocks are removed. This fixes "Minecraft syndrome" where the world near the spawn area is slowly used up and turned into wasteland.

3. LOD compression to hide the lack of blocks in the distance while maintaining frame rate. Any distortions to blocks needed to conform to the sphere happen in this region beyond any loaded blocks. This could be configurable to just having the distance invisible or perfectly flat to help older computers.
ADVANTAGES:

• No need to generate surface when flying at high altitude
• Configurable to perform reasonably on most machines
• Immersion

4. Angle relativity to planet surface (see my previous posts) with no gaps or overlaps between most segments. Ships can be obscured by the atmosphere from above and below (except on radar) to hide the abrupt transition from universe-relative to surface-relative angle from outside observers (angle remains the same for observers onboard a ship). A re-entry effect could be added so it doesn't look like a ship appeared out of nowhere.
ADVANTAGES:

• Immersion
• Fewer or no annoying overlaps or gaps to disrupt construction.
• No distortion of blocks

 

[WaffulMann]

I think the best course of action in the case of a planet overhaul is going to be some combination of the many ideas displayed here.
This would require a lot of work and coding and take a long time to implement, but in my opinion it would be worth it. Planets really seem like an underused feature right now, and making them this amazing would cure that in a flash.

1. Increased realism of having far larger and far, far rarer planets (as few as three in a star system, and fewer star systems).
ADVANTAGE: Reasonable level of realism and makes planets more valuable.

2. Seed-based fast-generation to save data and save only chunks that a player has added blocks to. Generate ONLY the surface chunks unless something lands or the surface is disturbed by something like weapons fire or mining beams.
ADVANTAGES:

• Will not use much save data - in fact it may use less than the current system which generates entire planets and saves them!
• Ore is replenished when the area regenerates. This could be refined to delete/regenerate abandoned areas after all manmade blocks are removed. This fixes "Minecraft syndrome" where the world near the spawn area is slowly used up and turned into wasteland.

3. LOD compression to hide the lack of blocks in the distance while maintaining frame rate. Any distortions to blocks needed to conform to the sphere happen in this region beyond any loaded blocks. This could be configurable to just having the distance invisible or perfectly flat to help older computers.
ADVANTAGES:

• No need to generate surface when flying at high altitude
• Configurable to perform reasonably on most machines
• Immersion

4. Angle relativity to planet surface (see my previous posts) with no gaps or overlaps between most segments. Ships can be obscured by the atmosphere from above and below (except on radar) to hide the abrupt transition from universe-relative to surface-relative angle from outside observers (angle remains the same for observers onboard a ship). A re-entry effect could be added so it doesn't look like a ship appeared out of nowhere.
ADVANTAGES:

• Immersion
• Fewer or no annoying overlaps or gaps to disrupt construction.
• No distortion of blocks

you. now. make a thread.

 

[Proxima_Centauri]

@aceface
Yeah having 1:1 planets simply isn't compatible with this game's structure (you could have the entire Starmade community on a single planet and nobody would be able to find each other)

I still think the current planets are too small, though. Even the "400-500r" ones are at most small planetoids. Building a ship that's as large as a planet should be a near impossible feat

 

[FunnyBunny14]

Have you actually mined an entire planet once? They are significantly bigger than the asteriods.
And I know you mean in real life, but seriously, this is starmade!
Ans now my favorite phrase:
It has spacefriction for goodness sake!

 

[NeonSturm]

Yeah having 1:1 planets simply isn't compatible with this game's structure (you could have the entire Starmade community on a single planet and nobody would be able to find each other)

Or just make planets 10'000r (with bigger sectors ofc) and have "floating islands" or a large sea made of generic lava/water.

It is the distance between buidlings on planets that enables the use of planetary vessels and makes planets look awesome. you could have 500m or 1km range sensors.[DOUBLEPOST=1411261381,1411261250][/DOUBLEPOST]

It has spacefriction for goodness sake!

Set 25..50% dampening and call it "relative acceleration" rather than "relative movement" :p

 

[WaffulMann]

Look at this video. Notice there are no loading screens.
In fact I'm going to gather the best posts from this thread and push this "3d mapping planets" movements for bigger better and more realistic planets.

Did I mention that was done by one person? Yeah, schema has actual competition :3

 

[Valiant70]

Have you actually mined an entire planet once? They are significantly bigger than the asteriods.
And I know you mean in real life, but seriously, this is starmade!
Ans now my favorite phrase:
It has spacefriction for goodness sake!

"Spacefriction" needs to die and be replaced by automatic thruster breaking on empty ships. Starmade's "planets" are tiny and nowhere near round, making them planetoids.

 

[FunnyBunny14]

But why do we need round planets? I personally like different. And the gravity change from plate to plate is quite different.

 

[WaffulMann]

But why do we need round planets? I personally like different. And the gravity change from plate to plate is quite different.

well for 1, the gravity change is disorientating and there are huge cliffs between each face, and 2. a round planet is a single surface to build on and you don't have to break your city into districts.

 

[FunnyBunny14]

The gap isn't that big anymore (it's just enough for a player to fall through) and the only reason the gravity changes are disorienting is because a bug makes your view move every time the gravity changes,

 

[WaffulMann]

The gap isn't that big anymore (it's just enough for a player to fall through) and the only reason the gravity changes are disorienting is because a bug makes your view move every time the gravity changes,

still, districts and loading. Perhaps if the current planets used 3d mapping and are 30x larger...

 

[FunnyBunny14]

They do need a lot of improvement. I think that it would really help if the game saw the planet core and its segments as one entity. That would mean that the occlusion culling would finally prevent the game from loading all the segments.