PDCWolf

What are the scope and camera settings for that? Because if you used those exposure settings anywhere else, you'd go blind in white as soon as anything brighter showed up. Bright stuff definitely hides anything nearby that's less bright. That's pretty much the point of the other thread. From that thread we also know that astronauts at night, what'd be the shadow of the Earth can see uncountable stars more than being on Earth. Even at night atmospheric extinction and pollution are still a thing here. Whilst the Rocinante image is exaggerated, the only thing that'd change is you'd see less stars total. I'll boot up space engine in a while and just take a couple shots, the objective side of this topic is clearly lacking some finalizing closure for some. Yep, point of this and the other thread: Exposure should adjust to the situation, so if super bright nearby stuff is in the frame, you don't see stars. If nothing bright is nearby because you're in interstellar space, you see almost all the stars. [snip]

That's why I searched the mathematical answer. When looking at the ship you'd have no color vision, no capacity to discern details, and completely unable to do any sort of work if you don't have your own lighting. That's why the background being filled with stars is so poetic. You'd have a background filled with stars, incredibly more than we see on Earth, yet out of those millions of light sources, not a single one or the combination of all of them is enough for you to see something that's right in front of you. That's pretty much unique to dark space, yet "designers" insists that their solution of making everything pitch black, or put magic color clouds in space is "better". A bunch of bull feces.

I should be asking you at this point, since you've been pretty much pushed the goalposts a whole marathon: "Yes [there's a light source] depending on exposure" > Mathematically disproven. Even with a whole lot exposure to see nebulae you'd still only see the black silhouette of your ship. "Gameplay over graphics" "Not an engaging gameplay feature" (over multiple posts, only bothered linking the first couple) > Yet you gladly never mentioned this again when reminded that lighting was part of the design [1] and gameplay [2] for the first game. "the player shouldn't need lights to interact with parts in the same manner." (another one with different wording) > Again, dodged when it was made clear that lights, even in complete darkness, aren't necessary pretty much by design with all the extra tools the game provides. Lights are rather just another solution on the list [1] [2]. "lights would probably erode on an interstellar vessel" (another repeat)> Simple stuff you're missing just to try and have a point, and then completely ignoring and jumping onto the next argument when called out. At relativistic speeds, damage wouldn't stop at lights, but the entire vessel. At FTL, dust and even gas atoms could be fatal to a spacecraft. Since you're ignoring my points anyway, here's Dr. Sten Odenwald explaining it in his blog. Now I gave you an image that is 99% pitch black image from KSP1, to the point the only parts you can barely distinguish are bright white, and suddenly that condition seems good enough for you to fumble around with parts. Even the weather is more consistent. I made this post recalling all previous points to see either what tidbit you nitpick to run off with, or how you'd dodge the entirety of the thread and come up with a different point. This is an opinion, and so happens to be different from mine.

Lmao it's like really we haven't played KSP1 have we. Have some screenies, all from inside the solar system, on the shadow of planets: https://i.imgur.com/ygsRMJm.png and https://i.imgur.com/8pj1xqK.png Sure, you're not blinded, but unless you crank everything up, you still need lights. As for not using lights, laughable prediction at best. Even with super night vision, there'd still be not enough light to work. How they made it: How it could look with a bit more exposure if they'd gone for realism instead of random magic color clouds: That's what we're all gonna do, hopefully.

Says, after a lot of participants in the thread clearly lack the ingenuity to put a light on their ships, or to use the extensive set of features designed specifically to operate under dark environments (all of which already exist in the first game). (all of which already exist in the first game). It's like we're discussing KSP2 but no one has played KSP1. Pitch dark environments exist in KSP1, and it already has a whole suit of tools to deal with it.

I understand progression, but we're not talking about jumping from High TRW low ISP engines to a Nerva, we're talking about complete invalidation of a technology as soon as you unlock the next. In real life, gas lamps are still in use, widely, as we live in a world and society that's varied enough that people still have to give them active use, whether by circumstance, need or obligation. Plus, as you've said many times before, this is a game, and there's gotta be a balance around gameplay. If we've to throw an entire section of gameplay out the window, why even have it in the fist place? This makes sense, and is an attractive idea, but only solves the dilemma partially. Sorry 4 the massive off-topic, back to why we're here: The cold, dark, lonely vacuum between the stars is a unique setting, and the only place where the universe gets incredibly scary as well (unless you go intergalactic, or inter-supercluster. We'd be losing the experience to magical light. Sad.

Remember that light emitted by the sun is also scaled down, that's why Eeloo is dark-ish as well. It'll really depend on how far apart they set those stars to be. If we haven't solved the devastating effects of collisions that can happen during relativistic (and let alone FTL) travel, then we haven't solved relativistic/FTL travel at all. This is a different topic, but how they'll manage relativistic/FTL tech whilst keeping chemical rockets relevant is still something I'm very much concerned about.

Gotta love the dodging. You do not need lights on probes, you've got the highlight, action groups, the UI full of telemetry.

You do not. You have instruments, a full UI providing lots of telemetry, and action groups and actually, for manned ships, Kerbals on EVA already have lights integrated into them. Hmm, kinda like it's all there for working in darkness, which you do already in all those scenarios I mentioned but you magically don't consider them the same: Landing in the dark is an engaging gameplay feature, packing lights seems ok by you. Docking in the dark is an engaging gameplay feature, packing lights seems ok by you. EVAing in the dark is an engaging gameplay feature, packing lights seems ok by you, suits have their own lights for this already. Going into interstellar space puts you in the dark, a pretty unique characteristic of this setting, but here light is not a gameplay mechanic, you need to see the ship magically at all costs... hmm?

For you. On the other hand: Eclipses, atmospheric haze, solar panels, every mod that includes a greenhouse, landing on the dark side of a body, night launches, night docking. Lighting as a mechanic is already there in multiple forms, let us not pretend that this is the only way light would play a role. Autonomous ships don't need human input or vigilance in the first place, that's what autonomy is there for. However, in the case of KSP, you don't even need lights, remember that you have instruments, and you don't need to interact with the ship via clicking either, that's what a different mechanic is there for: action groups. Really you've failed to bring any problem that isn't actually already solved with actual mechanics that are part of the first game. Yeah, a reflective skin would help with visibility a bit, though working on the outside of a ship that's almost a complete mirror would be pretty scary and surreal. I'd doubt manned ships wouldn't include external floodlights along with something like collision lights.

A game where you literally build rockets that can overcome the challenges of spaceflight... Guess we should remove batteries, as being able to control your craft trumps the novelty of electricity management. Don't take me wrong, you're entitled to your opinion, just don't try to disguise it as the obvious, objective, gameplay design choice. Fake ambient light is not gameplay, designing your ship around simulated mechanics is gameplay.

Discerning is not the same as seeing, resolving, etc. That's why the discussion includes a mathematical solution and a simple to understand conclusion: "You will not be able to make out any kind of details. You will be essentially colour blind. You will be able to see the presence of "large" white/light objects, but details will be impossible to make out." Remember that this is for the case of being in eva and wanting to work on the exterior of your ship, so as close as possible. The purpose of the discussion is different, but it is rooted in the same subject matter: How cameras and eyes perceive stuff in different lighting situations. The other thread was "too much light, so you adjust down and lose dim stars", this thread is "too little light, so you adjust up and see stars, but it's still not enough light to see the ship". Finally, those starshades have a very different purpose: They're trying to see the planetshine on an object that's merely arcmilliseconds away from a light source (their parent star) hundreds of magnitudes brighter. Those "starshades" block a single star, only to be able to make out the planets next to it. If anything it proves my point on the other thread: Big light make small light not visible.

Might come off as a jerk, won't deny that, but it is probably because I'm not a native English speaker. Anyways, my point in that thread was that, for cameras, adjusting the exposure to (for example) discern surface features on a sunlit planet, or "toning down" the sun to see the rest of the objects, pretty much removes any stars from the picture, as they're the dimmest light sources. Whilst for the eyes the effect might not be so extreme, they will still try to adapt to lighting conditions, thus looking at a bright moon, a street lamp, a reflective hull of a spaceship, or other light sources will also wash off stars from your sight. So in the end my suggestion was to follow reality, and dim (or disappear) the stars from the skybox when appropriate. In that thread I did not argue a single point with people that expressed opinions on whether they liked the idea or not, I only kept my arguments centered on people that wanted to discuss reality. In this thread, in interstellar space, you'd have a full background of stars, as they're the only light source, but they don't give off nearly enough light to illuminate a ship travelling in the interstellar medium. Thus you'd see not much more than a black silhouette, unless your ship was the brightest white possible (you'd barely gain any detail anyways). For those cases I presented evidence from the past thread, plus that new stackoverflow answer that mathematically calculates for eyesight that you would indeed only see the silhouette of the ship. My intention is (was, in the other thread) to cement what actual facts are, and we did that back then with simulation software, astronauts' experiences, and maths. What I wanted to do here is to reuse that same factual foundation as soon as I saw the discussion was going that same way. Hopefully, if we all agree on that factual foundation (hard to disagree without some good evidence), we can move on to actual opinions and not further beat the dead horse back into its constituent atoms.

Gameplay would be using the tools the game gives you: lights and floodlamps. Relying on a magical hardcoded solution like fake ambient light is not gameplay.

Are we gonna compare the decision of one or two game designers against the potential tens of thousands of voluntary searches and downloads of mods? Also, if you read again, what I have a problem with is attempting to objectively define "good game design". The extensive and super diverse catalog of successful indies gladly makes fun of anyone who thinks a single solution is the only way to design any game. wowowow, did you just attempt to give a realistic solution to a real challenge of interstellar spaceflight like putting lights on your craft? calm down bro, people don't think that far ahead as you can see. Yes.

The difference from that discussion to this one is that here we'd actually see the stars, since those are the only light sources, and they aren't much brighter from one another to wash each other off the sensor. What we wouldn't see here is the ship, it'd be almost a fully featureless black silhouette if realism were to be followed. On that other thread we exposed how if you adjust exposure to see (for example) surface features on a daylit planet, or for the sun to not blind you, you'd be washing off stars from the sky. Just different situations that end up working the exact opposite. The downloads on mods like DOE, Scatterer, PlanetShine and other lighting fixes all kinda speak against the people that think they objectively know what good game design is.

Camera vs eye chicanery, anecdotals as source (specially since everyone seemingly has super eyes and lives in the middle of the Niue pacific dark spot when arguing what they can see). All of that has been gladly debunked, and we know (thanks to hard source chasing and original investigation work through simulation software) what a camera is capable of doing, and what the sky would look like in a myriad of situations. We've beaten that horse into jelly on what still is the most replied to single-idea thread on the suggestions forum. Everyone is entitled to their opinion and those are to be respected, but opinions are not facts, and we've worked hard enough on the facts already. For example, this is an opinion (which I don't agree with): This image depicts a fact, that no matter how high you crank up the exposure (even to perfectly see nebulae), stars alone will not light your ship up: And to dispel further chicanery, even with the human eye, you'd need a perfectly bright white ship to discern its silhouette in starlight alone, mathematically calculated: https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/25901/how-bright-is-starlight-in-deep-space#:~:text=So let us say that,discern it even in starlight.

Not this again, thought we had left this back on that other thread once all camera chicanery got debunked by both NASA sources and Space Engine camera setting simulations.

Voyagers right now exists in perpetual darkness, and they're barely outside out solar system. The space between stars is the darkest out there, only beaten by intergalactic and inter-supercluster spaces. However, you would see a lot of stars, since there'd be no other light source. However, since we'd be speaking about camera lenses, exposure settings could probably tone down the background, OR overexpose to bring even more stars into view (though the ship would still be unlit). Since newest footage doesn't seem to reflect these suggested improvements, I have little hope for whatever they do with interstellar space lighting other than generic skyboxes.

Just letting you know you've got some demand. I'd like to wish for the reputation bar in career mode to turn into a number... please?

No. NFTs are an amazing technology. Art and gaming items are probably the most wasteful, useless way to implement those technologies to force fake digital scarcity at the cost of computer work hours.

In this case, the math is already done for us, so it's not so much an implementation as it is a presentation of what's already there. Of course, it'll put people off if shoved in their face, but you can ignore them the same way you can ignore all those tools I presented. No mods, all of that is stock as of 12.2, and I didn't screenshot the clock because I modded it. TWR and Isp formulas, and applying them to dV are not simple addition and subtraction, that only applies once everything is solved and you can just manipulate values inside the dV equation.

Math is already there, copious amounts of obscure terms and numbers most people already don't know or chose to ignore, we only want to also be shown how to arrive at this information.

And you could just not look at the math, the same way a lot of people have no idea what the Isp, DeltaV and TWR readouts are until they take interest on them. +1 to the idea.

Great post. This also shows something they did straight up wrong. Overexpanded plumes in vacuum look nothing like what they show in this video, with that convex-ish pyramid shape: Adding a bit of insult to injury, they actually showcased the correct shape in a much previous video: Correcting exhaust behavior is a first step towards a jellyfish. As for reentry plasma, that's a whole different matter.