Distant Worlds 2 - Dev Diary #4

[ASHBERY76]

I like this.Open space while it might be realistic but is very boring in a strategic sense.

The ships in this diary are a lot better visually than the SpaceEmpires5 era ones shown so far.

[praetorreich36]

ORIGINAL: ncc1701e

This is awesome. Hide a fleet in a nebulae, ready to attack... [8D]

You do know sensors are useless in the Mutara nebula right? [:D]

[ncc1701e]

ORIGINAL: praetorreich36

ORIGINAL: ncc1701e

This is awesome. Hide a fleet in a nebulae, ready to attack... [8D]

You do know sensors are useless in the Mutara nebula right? [:D]

Saavik: Trouble with the nebula, sir, is all that static discharge and gas clouds our tactical display. Visual won't function and shields will be useless.
Spock: Sauce for the goose, Mister Saavik. The odds will be even.

[SirHoraceHarkness]

I wish this forum had upvotes. [:'(]

[Hazard151]

Will there be engines that are (perhaps) on the average slower but faster than the average engine in nebulae?

[SirHoraceHarkness]

Good question. If not then as long as the modding access is the same or better than DWU then it should be able to be implemented in a mod.

[Gertjan]

If the devs needs further inspiration for space terrain used in other games, two interesting games come to mind:

Conquest Frontier Wars, great use of nebula's and astroids etc.

Star Trek Armada, idem dito

[Ranbir]

ORIGINAL: Galaxy227



I am curious to see exactly how important "choke-point" systems are (if at all), and whether it's actually worth securing control over them, regardless if they have colonies or not. I imagine as the game progresses and technology improves, it'll be easier to ignore the potential benefits of controlling choke-points. With better fuel efficiency, longer jump ranges, and higher jump speeds, I doubt choke-point systems will remain relevant.

Choke points will definitely be important, since that is going to be the preferred routing of private sector trade/mining ships. This will thus develop a natural busy space lane. In DW1 since everything was going in a straight line there were many scattered lines. This new stuff will make it look more akin to how sci-fi shows present the idea of important 'shipping lanes', but thankfully they're not hardcoded lanes but just the more naturally preferred route for speed and safety.

This will make managing patrol ships better.

[Hanekem]

on the one hand I like the idea of adding some geography, so nebulas having an effect is interesting....
What about black holes also having an area of effect around them? or pulsars?

On the other hand, space is mostly empty, nebulas, and what other phenomena one can think of is going to be rather tiny in comparison to... everything else. Ultimately, I am a nerd, so space with no discernible geography is appealing to me. (or with very isolated geographical bumps that are very, very circumstantial)

[wetpig]

This is fantastic, when stellaris first came out before they made it hyperlane only, the lack of stellar "geography" was a big sticking point for me. Travel is Distant Worlds 1 even felt a bit to quick for me so this is a welcome addition in my book!

[ClassicAz]

ORIGINAL: WiZz

Personally, I don't like any limitations in a game like this. Should the terrain be present in DW? We play the game in space you know. The biggest issue with hyper in DW1 was HUGE ship ranges. Was it right when your starting scout could fly through 2/3 of galaxy? I don't think so...

I tried to think of some plausible scientific reasons for this existing in the game, and some technologies to resolve them that would also expand the warp range.

1) Parallax and Tracking Error

Assuming warp drives only go in straight lines (in 4d), The capability of your fleet to align accurately to the destination will determine how rapidly you offset from your intended target. Using the small angle rule tan theta = theta, For an alignment angular error of 1 arc second, you will drift from your target 1 astronomical unit (the radius of the earth's orbit around the sun) for every parsec (3.26 light years) travelled. Achieving an angular resolution of 0.01 arc second is very achievable in modern astronomy. This means that resolving power is generally not an issue, the milky way is 30 000 parsec across and the solar system is 40 AU. So an offset error of a few solar system diameters across the span of the galaxy won't prevent you from mapping a very direct route.

However just because you know where a star is does not mean you can align the entire fleet accurately to it without issues arising:

a) the ships ability to accurately align to the target may not match the angular resolving power of a telescope - this error I imagine would increase with the size of the ship, solar weather or other phenomenon. Would decrease with better gyroscopes and stabilizing engines.
b) relative angular errors in the formation of ships will place an arbitrary upper limit on the distance travel to avoid collision in the fleet, based on the largest angular error between two ships. This limitation could be overcome with fleet-wide warp bubble technology or other networked alignment features

2) Warp Drive energy output
Pushing Alcubierre drive through higher density fields (such as nebulae) may require more energy?

3) Occlusion
Stars far enough away to not be separately resolved by our instruments angular resolution will be occluded by foreground stars.

4) Timed warp bubble.
If warp bubble's are set on a timer like a microwave, then accurate distances to stars must be known to avoid overshoot or collision with other celestial bodies. Parralax angles will give you very accurate distances to stars within your angular resolving power, but there is an upper limit to this method. The distances of further stars must be charted by explorer ships or traded for with partner nations.

So i think you can invent enough plausible reasons for this to be a game feature, my only concern is what this does to the AI computational budget.

[Hanekem]

ORIGINAL: ClassicAz

ORIGINAL: WiZz

Personally, I don't like any limitations in a game like this. Should the terrain be present in DW? We play the game in space you know. The biggest issue with hyper in DW1 was HUGE ship ranges. Was it right when your starting scout could fly through 2/3 of galaxy? I don't think so...

I tried to think of some plausible scientific reasons for this existing in the game, and some technologies to resolve them that would also expand the warp range.

1) Parallax and Tracking Error

Assuming warp drives only go in straight lines (in 4d), The capability of your fleet to align accurately to the destination will determine how rapidly you offset from your intended target. Using the small angle rule tan theta = theta, For an alignment angular error of 1 arc second, you will drift from your target 1 astronomical unit (the radius of the earth's orbit around the sun) for every parsec (3.26 light years) travelled. Achieving an angular resolution of 0.01 arc second is very achievable in modern astronomy. This means that resolving power is generally not an issue, the milky way is 30 000 parsec across and the solar system is 40 AU. So an offset error of a few solar system diameters across the span of the galaxy won't prevent you from mapping a very direct route.

However just because you know where a star is does not mean you can align the entire fleet accurately to it without issues arising:

a) the ships ability to accurately align to the target may not match the angular resolving power of a telescope - this error I imagine would increase with the size of the ship, solar weather or other phenomenon. Would decrease with better gyroscopes and stabilizing engines.
b) relative angular errors in the formation of ships will place an arbitrary upper limit on the distance travel to avoid collision in the fleet, based on the largest angular error between two ships. This limitation could be overcome with fleet-wide warp bubble technology or other networked alignment features

2) Warp Drive energy output
Pushing Alcubierre drive through higher density fields (such as nebulae) may require more energy?

3) Occlusion
Stars far enough away to not be separately resolved by our instruments angular resolution will be occluded by foreground stars.

4) Timed warp bubble.
If warp bubble's are set on a timer like a microwave, then accurate distances to stars must be known to avoid overshoot or collision with other celestial bodies. Parralax angles will give you very accurate distances to stars within your angular resolving power, but there is an upper limit to this method. The distances of further stars must be charted by explorer ships or traded for with partner nations.

So i think you can invent enough plausible reasons for this to be a game feature, my only concern is what this does to the AI computational budget.

Well, my hesitation is mostly related to the random map generator being able to create maps that look right. I mean nebulas are, ultimately gas clouds, so they need to have a proper shape, thus creating a geographic map would be non trivial, at least one that would let choke points exist and look "non artificial" (personally I hope we will have more phenomena that nebula having an effect on FTL, as I mentioned pulsars and black holes are the two that come to mind, but you could have some "subspace anomaly" or some such)
Alternatively, I think being able to craft maps would be more reasonable for these sorts of things, or upload crafted maps (because I really distruts RNG map generation)

[Anonymous]

[Deleted by Admins]

[ncc1701e]

ORIGINAL: Grognerd_INC

You know way back when in Space Empires IV there was a realism mod

Space Empires IV... Ouch, I was still at school dreaming of a PC to run it. [:D]

[Rising-Sun]

I use to love that ol' Space Empires IV, then one day i found a nasty bug that ruined everything!

[Amoebanzai]

ORIGINAL: ClassicAz

ORIGINAL: WiZz

Personally, I don't like any limitations in a game like this. Should the terrain be present in DW? We play the game in space you know. The biggest issue with hyper in DW1 was HUGE ship ranges. Was it right when your starting scout could fly through 2/3 of galaxy? I don't think so...

I tried to think of some plausible scientific reasons for this existing in the game, and some technologies to resolve them that would also expand the warp range.

1) Parallax and Tracking Error

Assuming warp drives only go in straight lines (in 4d), The capability of your fleet to align accurately to the destination will determine how rapidly you offset from your intended target. Using the small angle rule tan theta = theta, For an alignment angular error of 1 arc second, you will drift from your target 1 astronomical unit (the radius of the earth's orbit around the sun) for every parsec (3.26 light years) travelled. Achieving an angular resolution of 0.01 arc second is very achievable in modern astronomy. This means that resolving power is generally not an issue, the milky way is 30 000 parsec across and the solar system is 40 AU. So an offset error of a few solar system diameters across the span of the galaxy won't prevent you from mapping a very direct route.

However just because you know where a star is does not mean you can align the entire fleet accurately to it without issues arising:

a) the ships ability to accurately align to the target may not match the angular resolving power of a telescope - this error I imagine would increase with the size of the ship, solar weather or other phenomenon. Would decrease with better gyroscopes and stabilizing engines.
b) relative angular errors in the formation of ships will place an arbitrary upper limit on the distance travel to avoid collision in the fleet, based on the largest angular error between two ships. This limitation could be overcome with fleet-wide warp bubble technology or other networked alignment features

2) Warp Drive energy output
Pushing Alcubierre drive through higher density fields (such as nebulae) may require more energy?

3) Occlusion
Stars far enough away to not be separately resolved by our instruments angular resolution will be occluded by foreground stars.

4) Timed warp bubble.
If warp bubble's are set on a timer like a microwave, then accurate distances to stars must be known to avoid overshoot or collision with other celestial bodies. Parralax angles will give you very accurate distances to stars within your angular resolving power, but there is an upper limit to this method. The distances of further stars must be charted by explorer ships or traded for with partner nations.

So i think you can invent enough plausible reasons for this to be a game feature, my only concern is what this does to the AI computational budget.

May I provide some immersion by suggesting some potential hazard to FTL travel due to nebula crossing, though I am not quite an astrology expert.
There is a video from Youtube titled: Dangers and Anomalies of Interplanetary Dust Revealed by the Solar Probe, by a productive Mr. Anton Petrov

When earth travels through these dusts,they become shooting stars. They are hazards to space suits and spacecraft if collided with in outerspace
Considering nebulae consist of dust, hydrogen, helium and so on (and Caslon!), it may cause some trouble to our future spacefaring offsprings, i guess.

[StarLab]

ORIGINAL: Amoebanzai
There is a video from Youtube titled: Dangers and Anomalies of Interplanetary Dust Revealed by the Solar Probe, by a productive Mr. Anton Petrov

He also did a quick review of Distant Worlds Universe back at launch calling it the "Best 4X Game Ever!" The man loves all things spacey! [:D]

[SirHoraceHarkness]

The particulate threat to spaceships traveling between solar systems has been known for decades and decades. I remember reading hard scifi from the 60's and 70's which used a huge ice shield on front of the ship to act as an ablative barrier to soak up random hits.

[ClassicAz]

ORIGINAL: SirHoraceHarkness

The particulate threat to spaceships traveling between solar systems has been known for decades and decades. I remember reading hard scifi from the 60's and 70's which used a huge ice shield on front of the ship to act as an ablative barrier to soak up random hits.

My view is if you have solved the warp bubble problem, exotic matter exists (negative energy is required to create an Alcubierre warp drive). If you have the levels of energy required to generate a warp bubble, then hyper-relativistically accelerated particulate build up (infinitely blue shifted radiation) at the front of the warp bubble is less a threat to you and more a threat to whatever you are accelerating those particles towards, ie your destination target.

There are a bunch of other physics issues with the Alcubierre warp drive, so realistically speaking the superluminal travel in game relies on some other means of travel. Else every ship becomes an actual star destroyer simply by going into warp drive mode.

[SirHoraceHarkness]

Well the old hard scifi ways of interplanetary travel was using near speed of light propulsion since they didn't put much faith in faster than light travel due to the energy requirements. This made travel to distant stars possible without cryogenics or a generational ship design due to the relativistic effect slowing down local time. But since running into a clump of hydrogen atoms etc at that speed would be catastrophic the ships tended to have ablative shields in front usually made of ice. As you say warp bubbles have their own inherent dangers.