wide asteroid belt

[DARGAN]

(google translate)

it seems to me that this has already been suggested a long time ago now, although in doubt, I can not find by doing a search.

Asteroid belts are really not wide, I think it is necessary that they double or triple in width at least, I will not go so far as to suggest the possibility of getting lost, there must be technical limits.

in reality it turns out that asteroid belts melts several thousand kilometers (see even several hundred thousand) wide but asteroids are much more spaced than they are in the game.

as it is a game, nearby asteroids are more fun but really not wide enough, in a boost we are on the other side.

 

[MBaldelli]

I believe there might be a limitation to the amount of objects that can be generated within a system. This is why we only see sections of them when we're looking for them on the navigation (left) panel. Because based on the system map, if we use our own Asteroid Belt here in the solar system, you're looking at 329,115,316 to 478,713,186 km and containing 1.1 and 1.9 million asteroids.

 

[DARGAN]

the developers know for the limit .. I think it is possible to enlarge it but the problem is more in terms of the calculation capabilities of computers and game console.

in any case if there is no problem from this point of view .. I do not say no to wider belts.. because it's really socks for the moment.

you have to move horizontally and not vertically to take advantage of it

 

[Bionic Bytes]

I've programmed an asteroid belt myself for my 3D solar system app. I can assure you what Frontier have developed is a technical master piece. I haven't tried, but I assume it's possible to mine each and every asteroid in the belt, so that would be a huge resource requirement to collision detect and track the state of each asteroid. Making these belts bigger (vertically, sure) would be even more immersive, but the cost in terms of memory and rendering performance....
I personally think the belts are great and really immersive, so I wouldn't suggest to FDev to spend more resources enlarging them when there are so many other things they could be doing instead.

 

[Shadowdancer]

A quick visit to the Internet suggests that the rings of Saturn can be as thin as 10 metres, and ranging up to "several kilometres", so compared to that, things seem at least partly correct.

 

[DARGAN]

A quick visit to the Internet suggests that the rings of Saturn can be as thin as 10 metres, and ranging up to "several kilometres", so compared to that, things seem at least partly correct.

weird I did some research also on my side finding the opposite..

but by explicitly looking for saturn ring that's what you say .. but these are not really asteroids but dust and particles.

this being for more fun a little wider would be fine .. my opinion.

I personally think the belts are great and really immersive, so I wouldn't suggest to FDev to spend more resources enlarging them when there are so many other things they could be doing instead.

I will write .. this is a secondary suggestion.. that can actually prevent adding other things by blocking resources.

otherwise there is Vulkan .. API it seems that allows to have more millions of objects on the screen.. I write that just like that lol.. I'm not sure that Elite Dangerous is shooting with Vulkan.. not, only the Switch (and pC) with Vulkan compatible for the moment.. but it's funny to see..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRVGY2DtHuI

 

[777Driver]

A quick visit to the Internet suggests that the rings of Saturn can be as thin as 10 metres, and ranging up to "several kilometres", so compared to that, things seem at least partly correct.

Yeah, my understanding was that all known rings are very thin. From a gameplay perspective it would likely cause issues having rings that are thousands of km's thick, I can imagine cmdrs being masslocked stuck deep inside rings, contacting support to be moved back to an area where they could use the FSD again.

It would be nice if the asteroid fields in ED where much larger, those areas of space currently only hold a few dozen asteroids at best.

 

[Shadowdancer]

but by explicitly looking for saturn ring that's what you say .. but these are not really asteroids but dust and particles.

Yeah well that's how rings happen, it's matter that's not mechanically stable enough to withstand the tidal forces in its orbit and clump together to form planets or moons. If anything, the many densely packed big rocks that the rings are currently all made from are "wrong".

It would be nice if the asteroid fields in ED where much larger, those areas of space currently only hold a few dozen asteroids at best.

Reality of asteroid belts: you see a rock, there is no second one in range of sight. Not to say that the "belt clusters" couldn't be made useful or neat in some way for gameplay reasons, because they sure are useless at the moment.

 

[varonica]

Yeah well that's how rings happen, it's matter that's not mechanically stable enough to withstand the tidal forces in its orbit and clump together to form planets or moons. If anything, the many densely packed big rocks that the rings are currently all made from are "wrong".


Reality of asteroid belts: you see a rock, there is no second one in range of sight. Not to say that the "belt clusters" couldn't be made useful or neat in some way for gameplay reasons, because they sure are useless at the moment.

It's worse that, at the average density of the asteroid belt around our sun the distance between objects if they were evenly spaced (objects large enough to register as a mass from our ships) would be around 8 million kilometres apart. it's not all bad news though because they tend to clump in areas like the leading and trailing Jupiter Trojan Points. I suggest this is what is being modelled when we jump into an asteroid field, an area where some have clumped together. The actual field is probably thousands of kilometres wide, but so spread out that the density doesn't give our ships sensors a sufficient gravitational anomaly to pin point and hence we can't navigate to them.

For gameplay reasons maybe higher density clumps, or larger, but not so large that it would be possible to actually be unable to escape in a reasonable time. Of course large asteroids like Ceres, the dwarf planets in fact, would be registered by our sensors just like many are now.

 

[DARGAN]

Well I'm not against the most realistic possible .. but it will require a redesign of a work appriori already accomplished.

i think i will just write .. what is done and done.. unless the work to be done is not so excessive.

 

[777Driver]

Reality of asteroid belts: you see a rock, there is no second one in range of sight. Not to say that the "belt clusters" couldn't be made useful or neat in some way for gameplay reasons, because they sure are useless at the moment.

Yes, what I meant is those asteroid belts should just keep going, even if a random generator keeps adding new ones into the game as we travel along. currently you are out of the belt with a minute or so.

Only use I've seen for those belts is combat, they spawn random ships, no authority or military ships to get in the way. Also great for screenshots since they tend to be right next to the main star.

 

[babelfisch]

Yeah, my understanding was that all known rings are very thin. From a gameplay perspective it would likely cause issues having rings that are thousands of km's thick, I can imagine cmdrs being masslocked stuck deep inside rings, contacting support to be moved back to an area where they could use the FSD again.

It would be nice if the asteroid fields in ED where much larger, those areas of space currently only hold a few dozen asteroids at best.

How about mass lock only appiles at spots with high rock concentration (if that makes any sense, I guess I also try google translator next time...)

 

[777Driver]

How about mass lock only appiles at spots with high rock concentration

Definitely should be a thing.

 

[varonica]

How about mass lock only appiles at spots with high rock concentration (if that makes any sense, I guess I also try google translator next time...)

Which as exactly what we already have?

 

[Morbad]

Which as exactly what we already have?

Yep.

That's what belt clusters are.

Rings aren't belts, they are rings.

 

[Limoncello Lizard]

I'd love to mine in rings that are so thick that I could get lost in them. I'd also like to see rings where the rings are very thin with rocks only a few meters diameter.

Very wide rings would probably be recently formed, so could be quite chaotic and dangerous, as well as having some unusual ores.

 

[Starwolfe]

It should certainly be possible.

Rings and the areas of them are seed generations, and somewhat randomized - no reason you can't do the same with belts or alter the properties more drastically.

 

[DARGAN]

(translator)

or even more type of asteroid field..

for example as described above .. in some, much less asteroid but a soup of dust and small particles or visibility would be difficult, like fog, or the sensors would lose their signature quickly.