Redesign SpaceStations

[jorn818]

So at the moment spacestations are prefabs that spawn randomly in sectors, instead I would suggest to do
something Minecraft does with their nether fortresses (although starmade is completely its own thing you can't deny that minecraft might have been an inspiration to the game)

I myself am getting sick of seeing the same space stations over and over again, but if we have ''parts prefabs'' then every spacestation would look different

How this would work:

You have different parts, Hallway-Horizontal, Hallway-Vertical Halway-CrossRoad etc.
These parts would generate kinda similar to puzzle pieces, so for example you would have a crossroad part
in the middle and horizontal and vertical pieces around it, then maybe a roompart.

in these parts monsters can spawn which would make for some interesting dungeon fights

 

[nightrune]

There are plans to do procedurely generated structures.

 

[kiraen]

Also, some stations are intended to be prefabs, like the new stick shops.

 

[Criss]

This is something that probably wont be happening for a while. There are some prefab stations that need to be worked on first before any of that happens. At least with prefab we know it will work.

 

[Deserea]

This is something that probably wont be happening for a while. There are some prefab stations that need to be worked on first before any of that happens. At least with prefab we know it will work.

Just a thought, and who knows, i may have missed if it was happening, or why it was not, but why not hold some more contests for space station designs! Could for sure add more station designs to the base game, could even have a thing where they have to provide different variations of it too.

 

[Valck]

Just a thought, and who knows, i may have missed if it was happening, or why it was not, but why not hold some more contests for space station designs! Could for sure add more station designs to the base game, could even have a thing where they have to provide different variations of it too.

Nothing to say against design contests, as long as there's no community vote with guaranteed inclusion for the "winning" entries.
A contest that serves as an inspiration is fine, I'd also be OK if some of the winners get hand picked by the design team, but please not another design disaster like we had last time around.

On another note, this is simply premature at the current state of the game - look at the stations we have already, all of them still use the old docking mechanics, some have shops with preset owners, none of them have docks that are large enough to accommodate anything larger than even my smallest ships, and I don't build big ships. None of them have been updated, and come the next major change in game mechanics, they all will have to be updated again - who is supposed to manage that workload? Adding more stations would only worsen the situation.

 

[Criss]

None of them have been updated, and come the next major change in game mechanics, they all will have to be updated again - who is supposed to manage that workload?

Hm...

http://starmadedock.net/threads/criss-thread.22052/

I have been covering this in my thread for the past few weeks.

 

[Valck]

Hm...

http://starmadedock.net/threads/criss-thread.22052/

I have been covering this in my thread for the past few weeks.

I had no intention of slighting your work.
I think the approach you're taking is the right one - focussing on a few builds, following a coherent design. No need to have dozens of new stations that may be brilliant each on their own, but don't fit a common style, built buy players who may or most likely may not update them on their own.

 

[therimmer96]

I think the approach you're taking is the right one - focussing on a few builds, following a coherent design. No need to have dozens of new stations that may be brilliant each on their own, but don't fit a common style, built buy players who may or most likely may not update them on their own.

He's working on updating the player ones, one of the most recent posts is the updating of Zeno's design.

 

[StormWing0]

Well keep in mind we can always add more stations ourselves but yes it'd be nice if we had a greater range of generated ones mixed in.

Say for example with gates or shipyards they'd be rather easy to generate. In the case of race and warp gates you'd need to only pick a spot, orientation, and radius or size. With shipyards you define the size and shape of the first arc and its position and orientation including the core anchor in it, than you define a number of arcs on either side of the first one and their distance from it.

Now as for other things I guess that could be up for debate.

 

[Criss]

I had no intention of slighting your work.
I think the approach you're taking is the right one - focussing on a few builds, following a coherent design. No need to have dozens of new stations that may be brilliant each on their own, but don't fit a common style, built buy players who may or most likely may not update them on their own.

For future contests the stations and ships submitted will be for randomly generated factions. If we have contests for established factions it will be after people are familiar with their style and we will approve which ones can make it in.

 

[jayman38]

Quick and easy idea for a fast win on this suggestion, using existing mechanics:
For each docking point on a station (assumption: use newer stations with the new rail blocks for docking), select a random ship from the catalog that is available for "others" to use, including a 50% chance of "no ship" at that dock, check the dockers on the ship design, and if there's a match where the ship can fit, attach it on there with inactive AI, and change the ship blocks to scrap like the rest of the station. Viola! Instant, virtually infinite variation, increasing as more ships are saved to the catalogue.

If you want to get even wilder: multi-pass algorithm.
That is, after mounting random ships to the station, do the same thing for these first ships, mounting other ships to available docking ports if they fit. Repeat for that second level of ships, and so on, up to a certain limit of iterations (e.g. 19), or if the station exceeds some dimension limit.

If this were implemented, you would probably see lots of "station part" ships become available in community content, specifically for the purpose of building-up modular stations.

 

[kiraen]

Quick and easy idea for a fast win on this suggestion, using existing mechanics:
<snip>

It must be my lack of sleep. But how is this in any way different from the original post? This is, in fact, the very definition of 'procedurally generated'.

 

[jayman38]

It must be my lack of sleep. But how is this in any way different from the original post? This is, in fact, the very definition of 'procedurally generated'.

My impression of the OP is that all the prefabs would be templates directly built onto the root station, not requiring dock blocks. A subtle but key difference. The effect would be the same, except that players could not just undock and fly off in docked pieces if it were directly-attached template groups. My suggestion is an over-powered bandaid solution, because some truly powerful ships could end up docked to the station, giving players a free ship upgrade, even if it is made of scrap.