Pls Loosen the Screws on the Planet Generator :)

[Sunleader]

Making it Short.
Dont you think its Time you Loosen up those Screws on the Planet Generation Software ?

Currently all of the Planets we can Land on. Are pretty much Identhical.
Crafters, Low Canyons. And Generally Terrain thats pretty Flat overall with only small Mountains and or low difference in attitude per mile.

In Reality its coming out more and more that there is Planets out there.
Which can have Deep Caves. Deep Holes and even Liquid Water inside them. High Mountain Ranges. Or even Features Resulting of a Collission turning the Planet rather Oddly Shaped as it takes Millions of Years before it actually becomes a Sphere due to Gravitational Forces

Yet in the Game.
The only Times we come across even a somewhat Deeper Ravine on a Planet.
Is because the Random Generation Bugged out. And ended up doing something that is actually Unintended by the Devs.

Several of the few Unique and Interesting Places are basicly Bugs lol.



So How about we Loosen these Screws on the Planet Generator ?
Honestly said. With all the Strange Findings we make in Reality on how the Planets out there are actually looking.
Dont you think having a Rigid and Strict Screw on that Planet Generator Limiting it to only the same fully Rounded and Flattened Shapes of Planet Surfaces is really Hurting it ?

Loosening this Up.
Might actually provide alot more Unique Places and might in Fact end up way more Realistic than the current situation where if you know one Planet you know all of them.

 

[[VR] Goooost]

I'm using this as a good reason for them to add the large magellanic cloud to the game. A new little galaxy where they can take complete artistic freedom and give us all the weird junk that they were afraid to put in the milky way. Let stellar forge run wild, you know?
They could even impose a system whereby none of the ships or weapons that you can access in the LMC can be taken back to the bubble, allowing them to put in all the wacky outfits that they had balance concerns over as well as anything that just didnt quite make the cut.

 

[Old Duck]

I suspect they would actually need to add more screws to give us what you want without breaking the game. That's what the new ice worlds were supposed to be, that promised feature we never got... In other words, you'll have to wait until New Era.

 

[metatheurgist]

You need volcanism and weather to make a lot of those interesting features...the worlds we can't land on yet.

 

[whothe]

Hmm isn't that what all those sexy POI's are? Geysers and magma vents?

 

[RolloTreadway]

You weren't here before the last planetary design change, I presume. Things were really short on variety back then.

But anyway, like metatheurgist says, we're only landing on airless rocks, they're not going to look all that different. FD took the decision back when they were first creating this game (and essentially continuing a principle that goes back to Elite 2) that their design philosophy will always favour realism over fantasy thrills. That's not going to change.

 

[Sunleader]

I suspect they would actually need to add more screws to give us what you want without breaking the game. That's what the new ice worlds were supposed to be, that promised feature we never got... In other words, you'll have to wait until New Era.

No.
So far the best Results came from the RNG being out of Control.
The more Screws and Limits you Add.
The more Equalized the Results are.
Because the more Strict the Range is on which the RNG can Add Features. The less Features there are and the less these Features Differ from each other.
So the more Screws are in Place. The more every Planet will look exactly the same.

You need volcanism and weather to make a lot of those interesting features...the worlds we can't land on yet.

Nope. Not really.
Especially in the case of deep Caves. it is actually required that the Planet has ceased being Volcanic.
The most Interesting Features are the ones Stemming from past Events of a Rocky Ball or possibly from the reason that Planet became a Rocky Ball in the first Place.

A Planet with Active Volcanism will usually not have Deep Caves because they would be filled with Lava.
And Weather is actually something that Reduces Interesting Features. Because Weather is the Reason why our own Mountains etc are slowly but surely being Flattened out.

Of example for an Interesting Feature.
In Reality we actually have rather Odd looking Planets.
They are this way because they just recently Formed (some Million years ago.)
And thus still have not been Pressed and Flattened into Shape.
Still having Huge Ridges and Canyons etc.

In Atmosphere with Weather Included. The Process of such Features Disappearing and the Planet becoming a Round and Flat Ball (like we currently only got in the game) is actually Speeded up.
Because the Weather deteriorates any Structures that emerge from the Ground.

Hmm isn't that what all those sexy POI's are? Geysers and magma vents?

No.
These are just Mini POIs which are also entirely the same everywhere.

You weren't here before the last planetary design change, I presume. Things were really short on variety back then.

But anyway, like metatheurgist says, we're only landing on airless rocks, they're not going to look all that different. FD took the decision back when they were first creating this game (and essentially continuing a principle that goes back to Elite 2) that their design philosophy will always favour realism over fantasy thrills. That's not going to change.

I have been here since the Beta.
Planets have gone for better and for worse after they got added.
But the Core problem of them all looking pretty Identhical has not changed at all.

As for Favoring Realism over Fantasy Thrills.
Actually....

The Current Situation where all the Planets are looking pretty much the same and have effectively been flattened.
Is Extremely Unrealistic.
Our Galaxy is relatively Young. (For Galaxy Standards) and the vast Majority of the Planets that Formed especially around Younger Stars. Should still be extremely Deformed and not yet Flattened out like they are in Elite Dangerous.

Flattened out Planets like the one you find everywhere in ED.
Should actually only be on Planets with extremely high Gravity or on Planets surrounding very Old Stars where over the Billions of Years they had time to adopt their Final Flat and Spheric Shape.


So from a Realism View.
ED is actually a Complete Failure when it comes to Planet Design.

 

[Ian Skippy]

I am confused, there are countless mountains and canyons that dward everything on earth...

 

[Old Duck]

ED is actually a Complete Failure when it comes to Planet Design.

To quote you, "No." ED is damn amazing when it comes to realistic planet design. Now if you want fantasy-land planets, go play No Man's Sky.

 

[RolloTreadway]

No.
So far the best Results came from the RNG being out of Control.
The more Screws and Limits you Add.
The more Equalized the Results are.
Because the more Strict the Range is on which the RNG can Add Features. The less Features there are and the less these Features Differ from each other.
So the more Screws are in Place. The more every Planet will look exactly the same.



Nope. Not really.
Especially in the case of deep Caves. it is actually required that the Planet has ceased being Volcanic.
The most Interesting Features are the ones Stemming from past Events of a Rocky Ball or possibly from the reason that Planet became a Rocky Ball in the first Place.

A Planet with Active Volcanism will usually not have Deep Caves because they would be filled with Lava.
And Weather is actually something that Reduces Interesting Features. Because Weather is the Reason why our own Mountains etc are slowly but surely being Flattened out.

Of example for an Interesting Feature.
In Reality we actually have rather Odd looking Planets.
They are this way because they just recently Formed (some Million years ago.)
And thus still have not been Pressed and Flattened into Shape.
Still having Huge Ridges and Canyons etc.

In Atmosphere with Weather Included. The Process of such Features Disappearing and the Planet becoming a Round and Flat Ball (like we currently only got in the game) is actually Speeded up.
Because the Weather deteriorates any Structures that emerge from the Ground.



No.
These are just Mini POIs which are also entirely the same everywhere.




I have been here since the Beta.
Planets have gone for better and for worse after they got added.
But the Core problem of them all looking pretty Identhical has not changed at all.

As for Favoring Realism over Fantasy Thrills.
Actually....

The Current Situation where all the Planets are looking pretty much the same and have effectively been flattened.
Is Extremely Unrealistic.
Our Galaxy is relatively Young. (For Galaxy Standards) and the vast Majority of the Planets that Formed especially around Younger Stars. Should still be extremely Deformed and not yet Flattened out like they are in Elite Dangerous.

Flattened out Planets like the one you find everywhere in ED.
Should actually only be on Planets with extremely high Gravity or on Planets surrounding very Old Stars where over the Billions of Years they had time to adopt their Final Flat and Spheric Shape.


So from a Realism View.
ED is actually a Complete Failure when it comes to Planet Design.

Stars don't need to be very old to have rounded planets and moons. I mean... just look around. And our sun is not old. Unless you're only talking about very new stars? Maybe there should be more severely deformed planets orbiting the younger stars, I can accept that, but I can also accept that it's not the highest priority. We know they've worked on the planetary generation system and are continuing to do so. We also know that it isn't the top of the pile.

And frankly, you're massively exaggerating the flatness. There are huge mountains and huge canyons out there. And lots of potatoes.

Also, could you please leave the shift key alone? Writing like This makes it A Whole lot More difficult To Understand what you're Trying To say.

 

[Ian Skippy]

And frankly, you're massively exaggerating the flatness. There are huge mountains and huge canyons out there. And lots of potatoes.

It is a perspective issue. Just like the massive mountain on the moon in the landing pics seem like a small hill due to a lack of objects that provide a reference scale/sense of distance. But yeah, there are huge mountains and huge canyons, and Sunleader went on an epic meltdown because he doesnt understand perspective.

 

[Sunleader]

I am confused, there are countless mountains and canyons that dward everything on earth...

Yes. And with a very few Exceptions. (Most of which were confirmed to not be intended)
All of these are miracously so flat that you can drive onto them with your Rover.

To quote you, "No." ED is damn amazing when it comes to realistic planet design. Now if you want fantasy-land planets, go play No Man's Sky.

Never Played NMS. So cant comment on that.
But no.
Terrain in ED is not even close to Realistic.
Maybe check some of Jupiters Moons.
Right now. Even our own Moon has Gigantic Caves and Holes that simply dont exist in ED.

Stars don't need to be very old to have rounded planets and moons. I mean... just look around. And our sun is not old. Unless you're only talking about very new stars? Maybe there should be more severely deformed planets orbiting the younger stars, I can accept that, but I can also accept that it's not the highest priority. We know they've worked on the planetary generation system and are continuing to do so. We also know that it isn't the top of the pile.

And frankly, you're massively exaggerating the flatness. There are huge mountains and huge canyons out there. And lots of potatoes.

Also, could you please leave the shift key alone? Writing like This makes it A Whole lot More difficult To Understand what you're Trying To say.

Good Call.
Look at our own Solar System.

Look at our few Objects without Atmosphere.
Our own Moon has Gigantic Caves.
Jupiters Moons partially look like Footballs lol
Others are inside a Ring.

Our Own Solar System has MORE Variety than the whole Universe of ED lol

It is a perspective issue. Just like the massive mountain on the moon in the landing pics seem like a small hill due to a lack of objects that provide a reference scale/sense of distance. But yeah, there are huge mountains and huge canyons, and Sunleader went on an epic meltdown because he doesnt understand perspective.

Not at all.
Just a simple issue of Facts.
Our own Moon is way more Interesting than anything you can see in ED.
You should look at it some time

 

[Ian Skippy]

Yes. And with a very few Exceptions. (Most of which were confirmed to not be intended)
All of these are miracously so flat that you can drive onto them with your Rover.

Err, no. I know of those errors you speak, but there are millions upon millions of massive mountains way taller than anything Nepal can throw at you. And they are not flat. At all.

 

[Old Duck]

Right now. Even our own Moon has Gigantic Caves and Holes that simply dont exist in ED.

I don't know anything about giant caves on the moon, but "loosening the screws" will not create caves in ED. That requires an entirely different terrain generation technique - voxels or something else. "Loosening the screws" will just create exaggerated, unrealistic versions of what we already have, and it'll look rubbish.

That's not to say that I'm satisfied with exploring boring moons for the rest of my days. I look forward to atmospheric planets that have erosion-based geology. Let's hope "New Era" brings us that. In the meantime, there are some interesting moons in ED's galaxy, and I'm sure people will give you coordinates of said moons if you ask nicely

 

[RolloTreadway]

Please stop typing like that. You can't seriously expect FD to read a suggestion if it gives them a headache.

Anyway, caves aren't in the design. In all likelihood, the difficulty of creating them massively outweighed the value of doing so. It wouldn't surprise me if they were in some 'might be nice, one day' pile, but don't hold your breath. And I doubt the community would be best pleased if FD turned up one day and said, 'right, we've not fixed any bugs, we've not got space legs or atmospheric landings, but we have poured countless hours of our time into radically changing the planetary generation code to add some empty pointless caves onto planets'.

This isn't something that is included in the generation code and been 'screwed down' too tightly. It isn't in the code because the code has to be put together by people working to a deadline and a budget, has to be affordable to create and maintain, and has to run on fairly low-spec systems. If that means missing out dark empty caves in order to ensure that we actually have a game to play, then I'm okay with that.

But aside from the caves... you're not making any sense at all. Yes, Jupiter has planets inside rings. There are planets on the inside of ring systems in Elite too! There's even a record of them somewhere on the exploration forums. Unless, of course, what you're after is shepherd moons. Can you imagine if every ringed planet in Elite had a few dozen (or more) shepherd moons? Can you imagine how much more data that would require, how much more server space, how much more processing power? The Sol system in game, the one most closely modeled on reality, is missing a huge number of known tiny objects, simply because it isn't feasible to run the game with those kind of things in place. It only generates detailed objects above a certain size, for reasons that should be blindingly obvious, and yes, those small enough to be irregularly shaped are indeed irregularly shaped. If you've not come across irregularly shaped objects in Elite, then you need to get out more.

There are potatoes, huge mountain ranges (yes, you can climb many of them in a vehicle specifically designed for the purpose, why wouldn't you be able to?), and plunging canyons. Go and enjoy the fact that we have a game which is able to design billions of them, and only costs a fairly small amount of money, rather than making up weirdly-typed nonsense that ignores so much of the extraordinary work that has been done.

 

[Sunleader]

Err, no. I know of those errors you speak, but there are millions upon millions of massive mountains way taller than anything Nepal can throw at you. And they are not flat. At all.

Millions of Mountains.
Less than a Hundred Different Setups.
And yes they are Flat.

Total height is meaningless when the elevation only changes by like like 1m for every 2 meters distance.

I don't know anything about giant caves on the moon, but "loosening the screws" will not create caves in ED. That requires an entirely different terrain generation technique - voxels or something else. "Loosening the screws" will just create exaggerated, unrealistic versions of what we already have, and it'll look rubbish.

That's not to say that I'm satisfied with exploring boring moons for the rest of my days. I look forward to atmospheric planets that have erosion-based geology. Let's hope "New Era" brings us that. In the meantime, there are some interesting moons in ED's galaxy, and I'm sure people will give you coordinates of said moons if you ask nicely

Feel Free too.
Always looking forward to check on things that deviate from the standard.

But as someone who during exploration bothers to actually also scan each Moon of a Gas Giant even if they dont give any money.
And also land on them to look around.

I can tell you.
Actual differences are nearly nonexistent.
Except for the bugs that is.

Please stop typing like that. You can't seriously expect FD to read a suggestion if it gives them a headache.

Anyway, caves aren't in the design. In all likelihood, the difficulty of creating them massively outweighed the value of doing so. It wouldn't surprise me if they were in some 'might be nice, one day' pile, but don't hold your breath. And I doubt the community would be best pleased if FD turned up one day and said, 'right, we've not fixed any bugs, we've not got space legs or atmospheric landings, but we have poured countless hours of our time into radically changing the planetary generation code to add some empty pointless caves onto planets'.

This isn't something that is included in the generation code and been 'screwed down' too tightly. It isn't in the code because the code has to be put together by people working to a deadline and a budget, has to be affordable to create and maintain, and has to run on fairly low-spec systems. If that means missing out dark empty caves in order to ensure that we actually have a game to play, then I'm okay with that.

But aside from the caves... you're not making any sense at all. Yes, Jupiter has planets inside rings. There are planets on the inside of ring systems in Elite too! There's even a record of them somewhere on the exploration forums. Unless, of course, what you're after is shepherd moons. Can you imagine if every ringed planet in Elite had a few dozen (or more) shepherd moons? Can you imagine how much more data that would require, how much more server space, how much more processing power? The Sol system in game, the one most closely modeled on reality, is missing a huge number of known tiny objects, simply because it isn't feasible to run the game with those kind of things in place. It only generates detailed objects above a certain size, for reasons that should be blindingly obvious, and yes, those small enough to be irregularly shaped are indeed irregularly shaped. If you've not come across irregularly shaped objects in Elite, then you need to get out more.

There are potatoes, huge mountain ranges (yes, you can climb many of them in a vehicle specifically designed for the purpose, why wouldn't you be able to?), and plunging canyons. Go and enjoy the fact that we have a game which is able to design billions of them, and only costs a fairly small amount of money, rather than making up weirdly-typed nonsense that ignores so much of the extraordinary work that has been done.

Then dont claim ED is Realistic.
If Realism is too much work then you dont get claim your being realistic....

 

[RolloTreadway]

Honestly, don't see the point in this. It's the suggestion forum. Your suggestion is 'have a degree of detail which is completely impossible for a game'. Because it's a game. And to back that up, you're still going on nonsensical rants about flatness.

This is not a suggestion. Suggestions are things which are possible, which would be feasible for the devs to add, which would make for a better game, and which respect the fact that it is a game, a commercial game sold for profit.

Suggestions are not rants.

 

[lenna]

@OP: You really ought to take a tour of the Guardian Equipment/Weapon/Ship data sites - there is already quite a substantial range of planetary variety.

As for whether we should have a greater range of extremes in current land-able worlds, I see no good reason for it. The fundamental problem with your idea is that it would almost certainly end up with ALL (or nearly all) the planets changing in look-and-feel as a result.

As for especially deep-ravines/high-mountains only being there because of bugs - say what? where do you get that idea? If they were common place then they would no longer be interesting don't you think?

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

I am confused, there are countless mountains and canyons that dward everything on earth...

I was thinking the same. I have just landed on an amazing planets with huge rifts cut into it with what looks like ice at the bottom while the rest of the planet is mainly rocky. The planets look superb. I think the main issue is that there is no frame of reference (trees, buildings etc) to properly judge the size of these things, but that is completely realistic on a non-atmospheric planet/moon.

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

Millions of Mountains.

Yup

Less than a Hundred Different Setups.

What does this mean. The planet generation is unique for every planet from what I can tell.

And yes they are Flat.

No they are not.

Total height is meaningless when the elevation only changes by like like 1m for every 2 meters distance.

Thankfully the elevation changes can be far more severe then that.

I can tell you.
Actual differences are nearly nonexistent.

False

Except for the bugs that is.

What bugs are these?