Is Atmospheric Landings a Major or Minor Feature?

Over the years, many have posted comments like "Atmospheric Landings is the one feature I want the most," and "Atmospheric Landings will likely be a paid expansion all by itself."

But sitting here on my lunch break, I'm struggling to see how clouds, turbulence, and rain/snow effects are a major addition to gameplay, or enough to charge for as DLC all by itself?

Granted, I haven't spent hours thinking about this, and likely others feel differently, so what do you think?

Will atmospheric landings in Elite Dangerous encompass a lot more gameplay and features than what I've posted above?

o7

PS - Please note I'm implying that (from a coder's standpoint) adding weather to a game is easy - I'm sure it's a huge challenge.
 
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I think some people use the term "atmo' landing" as shorthand for "planets with all sorts of advanced properties ranging from water, plant-life and (possibly) animal life to full-on cities with surface vehicles and an indigenous population".

It's just easier to talk about "atmospheric planets" than repeat all that other stuff. ;)

*EDIT*

To answer the question directly, I'd like to see basic atmospheric planets, even if the actual planets, themselves, are as dead as what we currently have.
It'd be nice to have your ship knocked-around by turbulence, get rain on your canopy and maybe even get struck by lightning (maybe causing your instruments to flicker and fail for a few seconds?) and then land on a planet with a sky rather than a clear view of stars.
Even that would add some diversity to surface-missions.

If they really went for it and created water, plant & animal life and cities, I'd probably just fall off my chair and have to consider naming my next offspring "Sandro". [where is it]
 
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I think some people use the term "atmo' landing" as shorthand for "planets with all sorts of advanced properties ranging from water, plant-life and (possibly) animal life to full-on cities with surface vehicles and an indigenous population".

It's just easier to talk about "atmospheric planets" than repeat all that other stuff. ;)
Yeah: I would be very disappointed if "atmospheric planets" would just be like Mars (as it is today, not Elite's 3300's terraformed version) & Venus and nothing more than that.
 
Full atmospherics using ED system of 'layers' introduced with airless planets is major feature - because it will include weather system, cloud generation that consistent across clients using PG seed, and so on and so forth.

Atmospherics at level imagined by FD is major feature.

Just dropping shaders and adding air drag isn't one.
 
Just dropping shaders and adding air drag isn't one.

You'd better make sure you've got your flame-proof suit on before you say that on the KSP forums. ;)

Just adding "air drag" is a MAJOR physics challenge and it took Squad 5 years to do it well enough to make it a standard feature in KSP.
I can only dream about FDev managing to achieve similar results.

Seriously, I wonder if there'd be any mileage in FDev talking to Squad about what's involved?
Seems a bit silly for one dev' to re-invent the wheel after another one's already done it.
 
I think some people use the term "atmo' landing" as shorthand for "planets with all sorts of advanced properties ranging from water, plant-life and (possibly) animal life to full-on cities with surface vehicles and an indigenous population".

If it was like this I'd buy it!

Yes ! It is a Major Feature !

:p

;-)

Yeah: I would be very disappointed if "atmospheric planets" would just be like Mars (as it is today, not Elite's 3300's terraformed version) & Venus and nothing more than that.

I think that's what's in my head because I've never heard them discuss planets full of life

Full atmospherics using ED system of 'layers' introduced with airless planets is major feature - because it will include weather system, cloud generation that consistent across clients using PG seed, and so on and so forth. Atmospherics at level imagined by FD is major feature. Just dropping shaders and adding air drag isn't one.

So, I totally get "weather systems" and "cloud generation" persistent across clients would be very cool. I'm just not sure if I would pay for just that.

But then again, I've spent a lot on paint jobs and bobble heads, so who knows lol.
 
Thinking about how FDev implemented space stations: Cookie cutter, static, no visible life (do the yellow trucks on tracks count?). Atmospheric landings would follow this same pattern. We are not going to see herds of wildlife roaming the plains or citizens walking the city streets. At best it will be sterile landscapes and some cities with weather. Actually this would be a big step up from what we have now. Low expectations are the key to happiness.:)
 
Sadly it's currently a non-entity!

Until FD even hint that it's close to being added in the game, it's not really worth discussing - it's purely speculation on something that we may see next year, the year after, the year after that....
 
Done right it will be a major feature, then again it might take all the resources of a major feature and feel like a minor feature.
 

Lestat

Banned
I want you to think of other games. Who put forth all they wanted. But they flopped. Thing is rushing is not a good thing. Time and effort is a good thing?

So Op Do you want Elite to flop? Or do you want Elite to keep going over time? We all want Atmospheric Landings. but if it is done badly like other games who would want to play this game.
 
Over the years, many have posted comments like "Atmospheric Landings is the one feature I want the most," and "Atmospheric Landings will likely be a paid expansion all by itself."

But sitting here on my lunch break, I'm struggling to see how clouds, turbulence, and rain/snow effects are a major addition to gameplay, or enough to charge for as DLC all by itself?

There would be a LOT more places to go. Some weather to look at. New landscapes and vistas to discover. New materials to collect. Perhaps collecting data on weather, chemistry, ecology and geology from the surface would be worth extra exploration credits. Terraforming installations. Simple colonies. Perhaps some new simple life forms. We could perhaps also get some new types of SRV that don't constantly spin out at more than 30% throttle. New types of ships for atmospheric operations. All kinds of things could be rolled into the game in stages as various levels of atmospheric planets become landable.
 
I don't see Atmospheric landings as just simply adding a weather system to planets, think theres a Lot more to it that we would all expect to see in the same DLC, different landscapes, vegetation, water, maybe wildlife, population.. and then you throw in other types of planets with completely different atmospheric compositions. If they're going to do it, it's got to be a major DLC, the community would be outraged if they released a rubbish attempt at it.
 
I want you to think of other games. Who put forth all they wanted. But they flopped. Thing is rushing is not a good thing. Time and effort is a good thing?

So Op Do you want Elite to flop? Or do you want Elite to keep going over time? We all want Atmospheric Landings. but if it is done badly like other games who would want to play this game.

I think not rushing out incomplete stuff is one thing, not mentioning the current state of progress at all is another.

I'd like to see the return of Dev updates, it would help give some context to discussions like this.

To the OP, there are two aspects to atmospheric landings (as I see it), the screenshot generator part, and the more things to do on the planet surface part. Quite simply, there is more opportunity for variety of both terrain and things to find on atmospheric worlds, even if they are mars/venus likes. I will concede that fully open earth-likes seem unlikely to be fully realised, but I look forward to the day I can take my Moray beneath the waves of a waterworld or land on a beach.
 
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Over the years, many have posted comments like "Atmospheric Landings is the one feature I want the most," and "Atmospheric Landings will likely be a paid expansion all by itself."

But sitting here on my lunch break, I'm struggling to see how clouds, turbulence, and rain/snow effects are a major addition to gameplay, or enough to charge for as DLC all by itself?

Granted, I haven't spent hours thinking about this, and likely others feel differently, so what do you think?

Will atmospheric landings in Elite Dangerous encompass a lot more gameplay and features than what I've posted above?

o7

PS - Please note I'm implying that (from a coder's standpoint) adding weather to a game is easy - I'm sure it's a huge challenge.

Its an overly discussed feature that spams the official forums with duplicate threads :D
 
If they want to continue using scientifically accurate models of physical laws to procedurally generate planets, then this is a monumental task as they need to model:

- probable atmospheric composition and density from the planet surface to the upper reaches of the atmosphere

- weather patterns, which in tern need to account for factors such as distance from the star, intensity of stellar radiation, rotational axis, status of the body as either a planet or a moon.

- effect of weathering on the landscape and the effect of the density of various rock layers has on the patterns of erosion

- the effect of the atmosphere and weather on the flight models of various ships, either modeling the effects of the geometry of the ships, or (more likely) using a "landing shield" and assuming "oblate spheroid". including the heat and static buildup that comes from an object passing through an atmosphere at high speeds

- effect of atmosphere interacting with light

- as most of the known rocky planets with atmospheres acquired them from volcanic activity, the effects of past geological activity will need to be modeled. and that is assuming the planet is not still geologically active, which is a whole other can of worms

and this is ignoring the relatively small problems of significant levels of water in an atmosphere and the gradients in thermal absorption of the planets surface and the resultant semi-permanent convection currents
 
I see it released in tranches.

FDEV already clarified that they will not release seasons anymore but they will only release full developed contents.

So i see it splitted in several DLC.

- The first could be lifeles planets, HMC without environmental features (just colored skies and some layers of clouds), icy worlds and lava planets.

- Second release could be the time for gas giants and HMC with aggressive atmosphere and environmental features like thunderstorms, winds.

- Third release I see ELW, Waterworld and Ammonia worlds with flora but not fauna.

All these 3 DLCs will come with some additional gameplay and contents to interact with planets.

- As last release I see fauna, new exploration tools and gameplay to interact with planet life in general.
 
I see it released in tranches.

I agree with your suggestion it'll be split into three or maybe more different DLC releases. I'm naively hoping based on the features introduced during Beyond (better planet composition/colours, gas/mists, and improved debris and ice planet graphics coming in Q4), that the first post-Q4 release will include gas giants and basic atmospheric planets with weathering, and perhaps even small liquid bodies. All these things could be used for game play, i.e. gas mining, collecting exposed mineral sources and surface liquids.
 
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