Request for ideas for new stellar phenomena

drkaii · May 22, 2015

Hi all,

I've got an Explorer's Community Request List thread and so far there have been no ideas about more stellar phenomena. I've done my fair share of physics but I'm rusty and I'm not an avid astronomer and I know there are loads of you here. Some of you even work for NASA.

So please can I ask you all to chip in new ideas for stars, planets, phenomena, properties and graphical improvements to the stellar forge engine.

Here's what I have so far:

Stellar Forge and Additional Astronomical Content

Add additional star types, including blue dwarves, black dwarves, Lambda Boötis stars, variable stars, magnetars, shell stars, dark matter stars
Add additional planet types, including phosphorus planets, chlorine planets, sulphur planets, carbon planets, silicon planets, forest planets, and include other proposed types of life such as sulphur based life to go with them
Add additional stellar phenomena like accretion discs, comets, Oort clouds, solar winds, dark spots on stars, live supernovae, gamma ray bursts
Add additional and more detailed properties to stars such as spectra, composition, magnetism, spin rate etc. This will allow more star types as well, as there are many stars that look the same but have different compositions making them unique
Add additional and more detailed properties to planets such as more atmosphere types, more detail about the composition (like element abundances rather than just "rock/ice/metal"), to name a few, and possibly different levels/evolutionary stages of life (think plants/animals/complexity) and even civilisation (think radio signals, cities, weapons)
Add more real objects to the Solar system such as missing moons

Graphics and Visual Enhancements

Improve the plasma surface of stars (it's great but could be better)
Make neutron stars more interesting
Improve the visuals of Carbon stars and other rare stars to look more unique
Completely overhaul Wolf-Rayet stars - they are exposed cores and shouldn't look anything like a normal O-type
Change the safe distances to stars so that we can get closer to giants, for example, and thus improve the perceived sizes
Fix the textures of certain Solar system objects like Ganymede and Europa
Improve draw distance of planets so we don't see them fade in at a mere 3ls
On inhabited Earth worlds, make the cities visible from space as they should be
Add water reflections
Aurora
Lightning
Geysers
Volcanic eruptions

There is so much in the game, and yet there is still so much not in the game. Black dwarves is such an obvious one that really should be here. But I want to hear of everything you can conceive of, using all your professional and enthuisiast knowledge to bring up things that we haven't thought of.

If this game were finished and a perfect galaxy simulator, what should it have that it currently does not have?

Feel free to put your ideas in the community request list instead of here, as I will be updating the OP with all ideas.

and ps I'm not really talking about specific fixes to inaccurate or missing objects like Nasty 1 or Eta Carinae - I'm talking more general phenomena

Spazduck · May 22, 2015

Great list! I will note, though, that I think adding blue dwarfs and black dwarfs may be a bit unrealistic given the universe isn't old enough to have any.

drkaii · May 22, 2015

Spazduck said:
Great list! I will note, though, that I think adding blue dwarfs and black dwarfs may be a bit unrealistic given the universe isn't old enough to have any.

Which is why I made this thread - I need you guys and your knowledge!

Varrag · May 22, 2015

I agree with pretty much everything in OP. My list below is something I've been keeping for months (and I've probably posted it somewhere already), so I'll just put it here.

- Massive protoplanetary discs stretching hundreds of AUs across the newborn solar systems, with protoplanets/planetesimals enveloped in gas and dust;
- Accretion discs;
- Interacting contact binaries;
- Cataclysmic variable stars;
- Very short time variable stars like for example Delta Scuti, SX Phoenicis, and roAp types;
- Feeding black holes;
- Pulsars;
- Fast spinning stars flattened by centrifugal force into an oblate shape, with plasma released along the equatorial line;
- Quark stars, MECOs (magnetospheric eternally collapsing objects) - hypothetical types of exotic stars; they are theoretically possible, so... why not?
- Comets;
- Rogue planets;
- Fractured planets heavily damaged, or breaking up into pieces after the recent collisions (should be observed sometimes in young and/or unstable systems);

Janichsan · May 23, 2015

drkaii said:
Add additional star types, including blue dwarves, black dwarves, Lambda Boötis stars, variable stars, magnetars, shell stars, dark matter stars

Blue dwarfs: late stage of red dwarfs. As already mentioned, red dwarfs have a much longer lifetime than other stars, and the universe is simply not old enough for blue dwarfs to exist.

Black dwarfs: cooled out white dwarfs. Again, this takes an enormously long time, so there are none in our universe.

Magnetars: wouldn't look much different from other neutron stars. There might be effects on the surrounding gas/dust, though.

Dark matter stars: purely speculative objects, and even according to the speculation would have existed only in the very early universe.

Agreed on variable stars. Lambda Boötis stars and shell stars would require volumetric gas or dust clouds in the star systems – which isn't implemented yet, but hopefully will.

Add additional planet types, including phosphorus planets, chlorine planets, sulphur planets, carbon planets, silicon planets, forest planets, and include other proposed types of life such as sulphur based life to go with them

Phosphorous, chlorine, sulfur, carbon and silicon planets as opposed to water and ammonia worlds, I assume? Either make no sense, due to a too low abundance of these elements or due to their chemistry being not suitable, or they would just be other names for things already in the game: technically, you could say you are standing on a "silicon" planet right now.

A forest planet would be an earth-like world. Contrary to what Star Wars and other sci fi novels and movies want to make you believe, life bearing planets with just a single ecosystem won't work.

Sulfur based life is highly hypothetical and unlikely.

A better addition would be "methane worlds", like Titan in our system.

Add additional stellar phenomena like accretion discs, comets, Oort clouds, solar winds, dark spots on stars, live supernovae, gamma ray bursts

Agreed on accretion discs and comets. Solar winds wouldn't have much effect in game, at most on the currently non-existent gas and dust clouds in the systems.

Supernovae would be cool, but what do you expect from that? There are in average two supernovae per century in the Milky Way. That's two exploding stars among 400,000,000,000. Realistically, it wouldn't make sense for more than one single star to go supernova in the time ED will be supported, and most likely, you wouldn't even notice it.

No one knows what causes gamma-ray burst, so any implementation would be speculative. Especially, since the gameplay effect would be negligible.

Make neutron stars more interesting

Improve the visuals of Carbon stars and other rare stars to look more unique

Neutron stars in the game look pretty much exactly like they should: tiny, very bright objects. There should be realistically gas and dust clouds in the vicinity, but the stars itself cannot be made more "interesting" without entering the realm of fantasy.

The same goes for carbon stars: they look pretty much like they should.

Completely overhaul Wolf-Rayet stars - they are exposed cores and shouldn't look anything like a normal O-type

Actually, there wouldn't be that many perceivable differences on the star itself: you cannot discern what kind of brightly blue glowing plasma you have in front of you just by looking at it. There should be more violent turbulences on the surface, and there should be dense gas and dust clouds surrounding the star, though.

Controlledpress · May 23, 2015

drkaii said:
Hi all,

I've got an Explorer's Community Request List thread and so far there have been no ideas about more stellar phenomena. I've done my fair share of physics but I'm rusty and I'm not an avid astronomer and I know there are loads of you here. Some of you even work for NASA.

So please can I ask you all to chip in new ideas for stars, planets, phenomena, properties and graphical improvements to the stellar forge engine.

Here's what I have so far:

Stellar Forge and Additional Astronomical Content

Add additional star types, including blue dwarves, black dwarves, Lambda Boötis stars, variable stars, magnetars, shell stars, dark matter stars

Add additional planet types, including phosphorus planets, chlorine planets, sulphur planets, carbon planets, silicon planets, forest planets, and include other proposed types of life such as sulphur based life to go with them

Add additional stellar phenomena like accretion discs, comets, Oort clouds, solar winds, dark spots on stars, live supernovae, gamma ray bursts

Add additional and more detailed properties to stars such as spectra, composition, magnetism, spin rate etc. This will allow more star types as well, as there are many stars that look the same but have different compositions making them unique

Add additional and more detailed properties to planets such as more atmosphere types, more detail about the composition (like element abundances rather than just "rock/ice/metal"), to name a few, and possibly different levels/evolutionary stages of life (think plants/animals/complexity) and even civilisation (think radio signals, cities, weapons)

Add more real objects to the Solar system such as missing moons

Graphics and Visual Enhancements

Improve the plasma surface of stars (it's great but could be better)

Make neutron stars more interesting

Improve the visuals of Carbon stars and other rare stars to look more unique

Completely overhaul Wolf-Rayet stars - they are exposed cores and shouldn't look anything like a normal O-type

Change the safe distances to stars so that we can get closer to giants, for example, and thus improve the perceived sizes

Fix the textures of certain Solar system objects like Ganymede and Europa

Improve draw distance of planets so we don't see them fade in at a mere 3ls

On inhabited Earth worlds, make the cities visible from space as they should be

Add water reflections

Aurora

Lightning

Geysers

Volcanic eruptions

There is so much in the game, and yet there is still so much not in the game. Black dwarves is such an obvious one that really should be here. But I want to hear of everything you can conceive of, using all your professional and enthuisiast knowledge to bring up things that we haven't thought of.

If this game were finished and a perfect galaxy simulator, what should it have that it currently does not have?

Feel free to put your ideas in the community request list instead of here, as I will be updating the OP with all ideas.

and ps I'm not really talking about specific fixes to inaccurate or missing objects like Nasty 1 or Eta Carinae - I'm talking more general phenomena

Black Dwarfs huh? You do know they're theoretical objects that would take longer to create than the Universe is old...

drkaii · May 25, 2015

Loving these responses, I will update my posts in due time with my errors. What other things ccan we come up with?

dognosh · May 25, 2015

drkaii said:
Loving these responses, I will update my posts in due time with my errors. What other things ccan we come up with?

well, how about checking your spelling ? totally kidding

You do good work here

drkaii · May 25, 2015

ya know, I actually caught that before I pressed reply, but I was like...meh, they still know what I mean

dannysquid · May 25, 2015

Great list. I suppose visible cities might be wasted effort until planetary landings come in. Whatever they do would have to be changed at that point. The night lights already feel pretty place-holdery to me.

We've been told comets are technically already in, just not revealed yet. Might there be complicated technical reasons for holding them back?

Greyhawk · May 26, 2015

Visible volcanism like Io and Triton.
Cataclysmic planetary terrain - such as Valles Marineris on Mars.
Outgassing - Enceladus.
Black Monoliths...

Whiterose · May 26, 2015

Great list, also dust storms would be good.

trollson · May 26, 2015

Changes to Stellar Forge?

One problem is that since (almost) all star systems are procedurally generated, then anything which changes the procedure will invalidate all those systems you've visited so far. While procedurally generation is a great tool - it can be binding once deployed.

You can make changes which add to what is produced - so long as that doesn't change the existing stellar bodies. For example; Comets, Oord clouds, Kuiper belts, persistent space wrecks, etc.

An alternative would if Stellar Forge contains versioned generators, with discovered systems tagged (server side) by the version at which they were discovered. The client could then reproduce systems according to the correct procedure version, allowing undiscovered systems to be generated with the latest version.

- Do we know if Stellar Forge uses a mechanism like this? It would be pointless (abeit entertaining) to discuss new planet and star types otherwise...

Glyphon · May 26, 2015

trollson said:
Changes to Stellar Forge?

One problem is that since (almost) all star systems are procedurally generated, then anything which changes the procedure will invalidate all those systems you've visited so far. While procedurally generation is a great tool - it can be binding once deployed.

You can make changes which add to what is produced - so long as that doesn't change the existing stellar bodies. For example; Comets, Oord clouds, Kuiper belts, persistent space wrecks, etc.

An alternative would if Stellar Forge contains versioned generators, with discovered systems tagged (server side) by the version at which they were discovered. The client could then reproduce systems according to the correct procedure version, allowing undiscovered systems to be generated with the latest version.

- Do we know if Stellar Forge uses a mechanism like this? It would be pointless (abeit entertaining) to discuss new planet and star types otherwise...

Not everything is moot. Things like visualisations based off the already generated information can still be added. Like the aforementioned volcanism and more accurate stars. As for how the system works I've heard somewhere unvisited systems are generated as you jump in but I could be entirely wrong.

EdzUp · May 26, 2015

Wormholes and unstable wormholes

iain666 · May 26, 2015

Glyphon said:
Not everything is moot. Things like visualisations based off the already generated information can still be added. Like the aforementioned volcanism and more accurate stars. As for how the system works I've heard somewhere unvisited systems are generated as you jump in but I could be entirely wrong.

All systems are potentially generated as you jump in, whether they've been visited by you or anyone before with nothing but a list of Discovered By tags (that need be against no more than body names - e.g. A1 by X, A1A by x, A2 by y, A2A by z, A2B by z etc...) stored server side.