Asteroid

[dprostock]

Since we're talking about assumptions, we could question KSP1's capture system about asteroids.
I would highly recommend reading "The Hammer of God" by Arthur C. Clarke, where he explains what a station intended for such purposes would look like, without a pogo. 

[Obnox]

Carrying on the discussion about asteroids it would be cool if asteroids could destroy bases in ksp 2. and maybe even leave craters for science .

[Clamp-o-Tron]

23 hours ago, Obnox said:

Carrying on the discussion about asteroids it would be cool if asteroids could destroy bases in ksp 2. and maybe even leave craters for science .

They already will if you’re astronomically unlucky enough in KSP1, and within physics range. To actually have this make sense background processing of asteroid collisions would have to be implemented.

Craters would be cool, but I honestly don’t expect encountering more than 1 fresh crater in each save.

On 11/15/2020 at 5:15 AM, dprostock said:

Since we're talking about assumptions, we could question KSP1's capture system about asteroids.
I would highly recommend reading "The Hammer of God" by Arthur C. Clarke, where he explains what a station intended for such purposes would look like, without a pogo. 

Yeah... the grappling system in KSP1 for ‘roids is a bit lacking. We know even more now (thanks OSIRIS-REX!) that IRL asteroids and even comets are more like dust gravitationally held together than the monolithic hunks we see in KSP (with a few exceptions, most notably Psyche). Grappling dust won’t work out very well, so I hope the grapplers are best for use on large metallic asteroids while something like a large net would be more useful for the dust piles.

On the topic of asteroids, I do hope that there are larger size categories of asteroids, good for large-scale mining or even surface bases.

[K^2]

2 hours ago, Clamp-o-Tron said:

Grappling dust won’t work out very well, so I hope the grapplers are best for use on large metallic asteroids while something like a large net would be more useful for the dust piles.

Just bring a really big vacuum cleaner, and finally use it for what the name implies - cleaning vacuum.

[kerbiloid]

Asteroids should not just splash like a brick, but cause a Tsunami, a Devastation.

The splash/ explosion intensity should depend on energy of the impactor, including the asteroids or a lost wrench.

The asteroids should fall on planets to make you trace, predict, and protect.

[swjr-swis]

10 hours ago, Clamp-o-Tron said:

the grapplers are best for use on large metallic asteroids while something like a large net would be more useful for the dust piles.

Even in the case of metallic or mineral asteroids there will likely be some small debris on the surface or floating around it, which could still pose risks for a grappling spacecraft or interfere with a proper grapple. And in the case of layers of more dust-like proportions, a 'simple' net is liable to throw up a cloud of trouble.

The only safe way to do this without having to use a long distance arm may be by wrapping it with some form of blanket material. Doggie bag to go?

[kerbiloid]

They could try to irradiate with nukes to turn regolith into trinitite.

Or cover with film, but it's much duller.

Edited November 17, 2020 by kerbiloid

[Soda Popinski]

15 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

Asteroids should not just splash like a brick, but cause a Tsunami, a Devastation.

The splash/ explosion intensity should depend on energy of the impactor, including the asteroids or a lost wrench.

The asteroids should fall on planets to make you trace, predict, and protect.

This would be ideal, but I recall deformable terrain wouldn't be in KSP2, which seems like it would be required for that kind of devastation.  It would be nice to see the asteroids break apart though. 

As for bases being damaged by an asteroid impact, I can't imagine they wouldn't be susceptible to that sort of thing.  I managed to destroy a space station with an asteroid back in beta 0.23.5.

[Bej Kerman]

34 minutes ago, Soda Popinski said:

I managed to destroy a space station with an asteroid back in beta 0.23.5.

Make "Don't worry, it's just a simulation. F9 time." your sig

[K^2]

34 minutes ago, Soda Popinski said:

This would be ideal, but I recall deformable terrain wouldn't be in KSP2, which seems like it would be required for that kind of devastation.

I sort of wonder why. It seems like on-the-fly tessellation is basically mandatory for any sort of terrain fidelity they'd be aiming for.  In that case, procedural cratering would just involve sampling from a crater texture on top of height map, biome, and procedural noise they're already sampling. It wouldn't add a whole lot to the game, but it also seems like it's easy enough to implement that I don't know why it ended up on the cutting floor.

[shdwlrd]

7 hours ago, Soda Popinski said:

As for bases being damaged by an asteroid impact, I can't imagine they wouldn't be susceptible to that sort of thing.  I managed to destroy a space station with an asteroid back in beta 0.23.5.

The colonies should be physics objects, so you could crash into them and cause damage, and possibly collapse them. If the original teaser trailer is any proof of that. I'm just imagining using an asteroid like a bowling ball and the colony parts flying everywhere when hit. Then, of course, explosions when landing.

[dprostock]

14 hours ago, K^2 said:

I sort of wonder why. It seems like on-the-fly tessellation is basically mandatory for any sort of terrain fidelity they'd be aiming for.  In that case, procedural cratering would just involve sampling from a crater texture on top of height map, biome, and procedural noise they're already sampling. It wouldn't add a whole lot to the game, but it also seems like it's easy enough to implement that I don't know why it ended up on the cutting floor.

Exactly, as if you were asking asteroids to own AI...