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Improving Laythe


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Laythe is a highly desirable mission target for KSP players. Without the use of mods, however, Laythe looks like a dull version of Kerbin. The oceans are a desaturated blue color, the atmosphere is jarringly bright, and the surface consists of monotonous, sandy islands.

That being said, how would you improve stock Laythe? 

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The best look of Laythe (IMHO) was without a doubt the 1.1.3 version with EVE and other mods that went along with it.
It gave it an aquamarine look from orbit and absolutely gorgeous colors from the surface.
If you can find my Jool-5 mission report from then, it includes all the nice pictures.

I had tried to commission the author of the mod to redo the look for further versions, but his wife just had a Baby and he declined my offer, sadly.

[ EDIT ] Found the thread in question, it was buried very deep in the mission reports forum and search function did not work, thank you google.
My 1.1.3 Jool-5 Mission - Mission Reports - Kerbal Space Program Forums

Edited by Francois424
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14 minutes ago, Francois424 said:

The best look of Laythe (IMHO) was without a doubt the 1.1.3 version with EVE and other mods that went along with it.

That was indeed a very nice version of Laythe, I remember this too!

These days I enjoy the JNSQ version of Laythe a lot. Completely different flavor as the one mentioned above, but very very nice in it's own way.

As for the question how I would improve it... sometimes I imagine aquatic life there, or underwater easter eggs, relics or ruins maybe. That would be quite cool.

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47 minutes ago, Francois424 said:

It gave it an aquamarine look from orbit and absolutely gorgeous colors from the surface.

I checked out your images. While the view wasn't what I was expecting, it was certainly beautiful! Kinda reminds me of @Gameslinx 's Kohm.

Spoiler

r/KerbalSpaceProgram - A new system, a new moon around a new gas giant. Meet Kohm!

1.9.1 - 1.10.x] Beyond Home 1.5.0 (Supports Parallax) - Add-on Releases -  Kerbal Space Program Forums

Images from this mod: 

 

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46 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

Its gravity is 80% of normal, so the mountains made of same rocks could be 1.25 times higher than on Kerbin.

 

then again, it's a world in a very cold zone that keeps liquid oceans because of tidal heating. a world like this is bound to have a lot of rains, that erode mountains.

on the other hand, it's also bound to have volcanoes...

 

anyway, i always said that laythe needs some underwater thermal vents. would be a great target for a submarine mission.

but it could also take volcanoes.

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1 hour ago, king of nowhere said:

a lot of rains

Below the plateau.

***

Upd.

The plateau could explain the name in Niven's style (see Mount Lookitthat).

When the Kerbal probe Koyager had approached Jool and sent the photos of its moons, the Kerbal scientists had seen a huge plateau raising above the clouds.

"Well.", said the Chief Scientist. "Gentlebeings, we did it! Lay the table!"
Everyone looked at the screen. Then somebody said: "THAT is the Table! Lay the table!"
"Lay the Table! Laythe Table!", were chanting the Kerbal Scientists, getting more and more drunk.

Next morning the Kerbal Scientists woke up and realised that someone of them (nobody could recall, who exactly) had already registered "Plateau Table on the Jool's moon Laythe."

Spoiler

hodor.jpg

 

Edited by kerbiloid
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I've said it before but I'll say it again: Laythe needs giant tsunamis like that planet on Interstellar. Would explain lack of vegetation and tidal lines in the sand suggest it's underwater a lot. Or alternatively, actual tides so you have to build a base on stilts as it would be underwater half the time.

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2 hours ago, king of nowhere said:

anyway, i always said that laythe needs some underwater thermal vents. would be a great target for a submarine mission.

but it could also take volcanoes

It does already have the steam vents, so both of those would be very fitting.

Some kind of vegetation would be nice too.   Heck, even without vegetation just having a few different shades of brown terrain would be great.

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2 hours ago, FruitGoose said:

I've said it before but I'll say it again: Laythe needs giant tsunamis like that planet on Interstellar. Would explain lack of vegetation and tidal lines in the sand suggest it's underwater a lot. Or alternatively, actual tides so you have to build a base on stilts as it would be underwater half the time.

Unfortunately, stock KSP doesn't have a wave system like Scatterer. A solution would be to make a small add-on that changes the "altitude" of the water in real game time. There wouldn't be waves, but the water level could rise and swallow any unprepared bases...

This, of course, would count as a mod though. :(

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why many people assume vegetation? laythe has an oxygen atmosphere, but that's no reason to even assume life at all, much less complex life like plants.

in fact, there are a ton of reason why laythe would be unable to have plants. from temperature to lack of sunlight to radiations. it could have microbial life, and even some fish. or it could be completely lifeless. personally, i prefer to never answer the question

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One graphics mod (I can’t remember which) gives Laythe luminescent clouds at night, which I thought was an interesting touch. Other than that, though, Laythe itself wouldn’t be particularly pretty to look at- dim sunlight would wash out most colours and with bland, mostly volcanic sands and rocks and an ocean that’s most likely close to saturated with salts would see to that,

From a biological perspective, life on Laythe (if it could exist at all) would most likely be primitive chemosynthetic microbes living on hydrothermal vents at the bottom of the oceans and not much more. Acombination of volcanic activity caused by gravitational forces, lack of sunlight to fuel photosynthesis, high salt concentrations- especially of heavy metals which are toxic to life- and the radiation threat of orbiting that close to a large gas giant would challenge even the hardiest organisms.

That atmosphere may have oxygen in it, but with so many volcanoes (some of those crater-like islands are likely to be volcanic in origin) odds are it’s also full of sulphur and carbon dioxides, which would explain how it holds a liquid ocean so far from the sun but would also make the air a noxious soup. Far from being a second Kerbin, Laythe could easily be its evil twin.

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1 hour ago, jimmymcgoochie said:

One graphics mod (I can’t remember which) gives Laythe luminescent clouds at night, which I thought was an interesting touch.

I believe that's Spectra. You can see it in the trailer at 1:02.

Spoiler

 

As for what I say about Laythe, I would enjoy a splash of color, maybe an odd patch of color that doesn't fit, only visible from LLO, and can venture down to see a special zone for life.

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9 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

The water is liquid.

Liquid water does not guarantee life.

A large percentage of Laythe has temperatures below 0 degrees Celcius. Therefore, the water has to be super salty (or super something) to lower its freezing point. Some extremophile life can thrive in super salty conditions, but the addition of cold temperatures makes the existence of life unlikely.

It is possible Laythe has "life as we don't know it". For example, Titan has ideal conditions for a hypothetical lifeform named the azotosome. 

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1 hour ago, wpetula said:

Liquid water does not guarantee life.

A large percentage of Laythe has temperatures below 0 degrees Celcius. Therefore, the water has to be super salty (or super something) to lower its freezing point. Some extremophile life can thrive in super salty conditions, but the addition of cold temperatures makes the existence of life unlikely.

The talk was about the temperature.

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13 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

What's wromg with temperature? The water is liquid.

If it's water...

i was thinking that trees require average temperature greater than 10 degrees for at least one month to grow, and laythe does not have that.  the fact that we have plenty of plants on earth, and plenty of tundra terrain, and yet none of those trees adapted to live there, makes one think that it's som,me kind of hard limit, and not something that could easily get adapted to.

then again, i was thinking trees, but it was mentioned vegetation. grass and shrubs can grow everywhere as long as you get some snow-free time, so my comment wasn't really all that relevant.

still, laythe is much harsher than it looks like, and i have a hard time seeing anything macroscopic living there

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  • 2 weeks later...

Some sort of 'algae clump' scatter object would be nice, but no macroscopic vegetation. Water just after a beach could be made a lot shallower to simulate either continental shelves or igneous rock layering depending on devs' headcanon on how the islands were formed.

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On 3/23/2021 at 10:35 AM, Vanamonde said:

I would like to see some vegetation, since it has an atmosphere. 

Me too. Like a Laythe Tree or small tiny shrubs. Would be cool if first time you go to Laythe shrubs spawn all over the place.

Cause Kerbals Accidently bring life to all planets but never grow due to not survivable, but laythe can harbor life.

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