Should ksp add other solar systems??

[TheGuyNamedAlan]

let me see, there are a total of 15 planets you can land on including kerbin. i really think this is a bit too small. 

maybe some other solar system should be added. so we dont always have to use mods?! mods do sometimes slow your game down. i really wish that ksp added some other planets or moons or solar systems. 

are they working on it right now???

thx.

 

[Codraroll]

9 hours ago, TheGuyNamedAlan said:

maybe some other solar system should be added. so we dont always have to use mods?! mods do sometimes slow your game down.

I'd say it's fairly optimistic to think that the feature would be significantly less laggy if implemented outside mods. Besides, I read somewhere that most stock players never advance beyond Minmus, or Duna at the very most. The tremendous step up in difficulty after leaving Kerbin's SOI, means that players either succeed and then try out mods for a wider game experience, or give up on the game altogether. If you're savvy enough to exhaust the 15 planets of Stock KSP, you're savvy enough to find and install a good planet mod.

[Wjolcz]

Should new members of community check the WNTS thread when they come to suggest things??

[Tex_NL]

Add more solar systems? NO! At least not yet. As I have said many times: (And probably will say for a long time.) First finish the game, then add fancy features.

Should people read the WNTS? HELL YES!

Edited May 14, 2016 by Tex_NL

[Drelam]

11 hours ago, TheGuyNamedAlan said:

let me see, there are a total of 15 planets you can land on including kerbin. i really think this is a bit too small. 

maybe some other solar system should be added. so we dont always have to use mods?! mods do sometimes slow your game down. i really wish that ksp added some other planets or moons or solar systems. 

 

Same here.

It's not that original KSP system was to small, but i think adding another Star system(s) feels like the next logical step so to speak.

 

 

 

[ISE]

Blackholes to other galaxies?  

Edited May 14, 2016 by ISE

[Drelam]

5 minutes ago, Tex_NL said:

Add more solar systems? NO! At least not yet. As I have said many times: (And probably will say for a long time.) First finish the game, then add fancy features.

Should people read the WNTS? HELL YES!

What do you mean with finish the game?

 

[cantab]

13 minutes ago, Tex_NL said:

Add more solar systems? NO! At least not yet. As I have said many times: (And probably will say for a long time.) First finish the game, then add fancy features.

Agreed with this. I like having many worlds, but I'd like even more having better worlds. The surfaces of KSP's celestial bodies are pretty bland. Even Kerbin, the richest we have, is boring close up and only gets interesting seen from an aeroplane.

But I'm not sure it will ever happen. It could be a lot of work just because of how huge even KSP's 1/10 scale planets are, the land area that needs designing dwarfs almost all games credited with "large open worlds".

And, I suppose, the emphasis of KSP is spaceflight, rather than planetary exploration.

[Drelam]

5 minutes ago, cantab said:

And, I suppose, the emphasis of KSP is spaceflight, rather than planetary exploration.

Do both exclude each other?

[pandaman]

Another solar system - no.  I think that's just out of scope. 

Enhance the bodies in the one we have - yes.

Then I'd be in favour of more bodies in the existing solar system.  Maybe a few extra small planets and moons inside the current 'boundary', but adding additional planets and moons beyond Jool and Eeloo would be good.  Another gas planet a long way out with multiple moons would be pretty close to a second system anyway.

The closest practical thing to a 'second' full solar system would be a binary companion to Kerbin with its own planetary system, but it would need to be close enough to be sensibly reachable with existing stock engines. 

[OrbitalBuzzsaw]

24 minutes ago, pandaman said:

close enough to be sensibly reachable with existing stock engines. 

Define 'sensible'

[Gaarst]

1 hour ago, Veeltch said:

Should new members of community check the WNTS thread when they come to suggest things??

Even though I couldn't agree more, the WNTS list was lost with the forum migration and replaced by the "list of common suggestions" which (IMHO) is less complete and isn't as good as te WNTS list in telling people "don't suggest it !".

Anyway, other solar systems ? No. Other bodies inside the current solar system ? Maybe. More interesting bodies ? Yes.

Edited May 14, 2016 by Gaarst

[FungusForge]

Well, yes, the mods do cause a drop in performance, but so would adding them in stock. Anyway, a new solar system wouldn't be feasible in stock for a couple reasons, the biggest one would be making a rocket with the Delta-V to get out there to do anything worthwhile.

Anyway I figure adding more planets in Kerbol's system would come first, and polishing the current worlds before even that.

[Tex_NL]

1 hour ago, Drelam said:

What do you mean with finish the game?

 

Bug fixes? Memory optimization? Stability in general? Any of those ring a bell or should I name a few dozen more?

[Drelam]

8 minutes ago, Tex_NL said:

Bug fixes? Memory optimization? Stability in general? Any of those ring a bell or should I name a few dozen more?

If you look at at like this, it will never be finished.

 

[Tex_NL]

1 hour ago, Drelam said:

If you look at at like this, it will never be finished.

 

There is no other way of looking at it!

[pandaman]

2 hours ago, OrbitalBuzzsaw said:

Define 'sensible'

I knew someone would ask that , I was being deliberately vague because that is very subjective.  Achievable in single figure decades with existing tech is sort of what I had in mind.

I haven't done any maths to calculate travel times, but what I have in mind as a 'sensible' maximum would be the current solar system having additional bodies up to about 3 times it's current extent.  Or if a 'binary twin' were added then perhaps expand the Kerbin system to up to 2 times current extent tops,  if the 'twin' star was roughly the same size as Kerbin and it's system about the same extent and the stars would need to be just far enough apart so that the outer bodies in each won't  interfere, so based on that the 'twins' should be just over 4 Eeloo APs apart.

[fireblade274]

7 hours ago, cantab said:

 

And, I suppose, the emphasis of KSP is spaceflight, rather than planetary exploration.

I'd say the 2 go hand in hand. One can tend to get boring without the other

[Pthigrivi]

6 hours ago, Gaarst said:

Even though I couldn't agree more, the WNTS list was lost with the forum migration and replaced by the "list of common suggestions" which (IMHO) is less complete and isn't as good as te WNTS list in telling people "don't suggest it !".

Anyway, other solar systems ? No. Other bodies inside the current solar system ? Maybe. More interesting bodies ? Yes.

I think it added a bit of helpful nuance. It means we can still discuss things but can (hopefully) try to consolidate repetitive discussions in one thread so they don't clog up the board. This, along with things like military parts should really be listed in a "not planned" section.

[Gaarst]

7 minutes ago, Pthigrivi said:

I think it added a bit of helpful nuance. It means we can still discuss things but can (hopefully) try to consolidate repetitive discussions in one thread so they don't clog up the board. This, along with things like military parts should really be listed in a "not planned" section.

Which is why the common suggestions on that list have a link to a thread discussing the issue, so that we don't have to go all over the thing one more time. Fact is, no one reads it.

[KerikBalm]

more bodies in current solar system: yes.

new solar system? I think not... at least not one that requires interstellar travel to get to.

However, it could be fun to have a variety of solar system variations to choose from... like playing different "levels" or "maps" on other games.

It could be fun if when you start a game, it gives you a choice of a few solar systems to play in, and then it lets you choose which planet KSC is located on in the chose solar system.

Right now thats clunky to do with mods... but it can be done. A sleek UI to choose would be nicer than moving file directories before starting the game.

Developing those new solar systems would take far too much work, but if people hosted their own creations, and the game could access them like user made maps in other games, maybe it could work.

 

As far as I know, the only reason planet mods make things slower is because they simply add more textures for the game to load, and calculations to do. Stock would have the same issue. as I understand it, kopernicus only changes game files at the very start, and doesn't slow down the game by constantly doing things

[John FX]

I have thought for a while that procedurally generated systems where you can enter a seed is the best solution, obviously 0 would give you the current system. Maybe 1 would give our solar system with earth etc.

Then anyone who for example enters 16527 as the seed will be on the same system as another player who enters 16527.

It would seem prudent for limits to be placed on distance from the sun and system structure/formation.

To my mind this would infinitely extend playability while not changing the initial game at all.

Maybe the end goal for each system would be to reach some point which unlocks the next system. Either a 'wormhole' or a monument on the furthest out planet.

Then the current game would still need to be played through at least once, keeping the 'Squad Vision' intact.

[Whirligig Girl]

There's a lot of possibilities for some interesting solar systems out there in the galaxy. So yes, KSP should eventually have more than the stock system. However, I think the stock system should be finished first. It needs interesting things to do on planets, and more things that set the planets apart from one another. Before jumping into adding more solar systems, we need the following:

• Three outer gas planets, along the lines of Outer Planets Mod. Each with a system of at least three major (spherical due to gravity) moons.
• Clouds. A major distinctive feature of those worlds in the universe that have atmospheres is the variation of clouds. They can spice up two otherwise very similar worlds. Think about how different a cloudless planet Eve looks from a cloud-covered planet Eve? While the E.V.E. Plugin's method of having cloud textures for each planet works fine, a procedural generated cloud system may look much better, being able to simulate the moving and changing weather patterns of the gas planets. (The clouds are, after all, the only distinctive visual feature)
• Things to do on planets. Be it a better simulation of geological (planetological) science, a colonization system, farming, mining, or even setting up a space center on the surface of the other planets, we need something to actually do once we get to a planet.
• Things that make individual planets interesting. Things like wind on atmospheric planets (including Eve), rain storms on Kerbin and Laythe, lightning on Jool, a hotter atmosphere for Eve, and dust storms on Duna. Things like gossamer rings and gas torus around Laythe's orbit of Jool, a magnetic field of radiation around Jool, cryovolcanoes on Vall and Eeloo. Volcanoes on Laythe.
• And of course, perhaps most importantly, make the game stable first! Fix the bugs, and please please please do not release based upon arbitrary deadlines no matter the state of the game.

Things I'd like to have before adding more solar systems:

• Revamp the Stock Kerbol System.
• Overhaul the terrain system. PQS is definitely not the best.
• Planet discovery.
• Either principia-style N-Body orbits or SigmaBinary style binary orbits for stars.

Now, with that out of the way, what sorts of other star systems could we have added?

• All stars are in the local Kerbol star cluster.
• An Analogue of Alpha Centauri system. A nearby system with two stars, a couple of hard-to-detect planets, and a red dwarf star orbiting them both.
• An analogue of the TRAPPIST-1 system. A small red dwarf with a couple of fat Io-like planets and a tidally-locked Laythe-like planet. (One side is Laythe-like, the other side is Europa-Like) All in a very compact set of orbits that bring the first two objects larger to each other in the sky than the moon in our sky. Compact red dwarf systems are basically just Jovian-type moon systems with a red dwarf star instead of a gas giant planet at the center.
• A blue giant star with a couple of scorched inner planets (the innermost planet vaporizing into space) and a couple of warm outer gas planets.
• A P-Type Binary system where the planets orbit around two stars.
• An S-Type Binary System with a large, but low mass red supergiant star orbiting a white giant star. Planets throughout the system, orbiting either star and one outer planet orbiting the barycenter.
• An analogue of the star system from Interstellar.
• And plenty more ideas where that came from.
• One or two rogue planets.
• A brown dwarf system.
• A few black holes. Larger ones might have stars orbiting them. The galactic core would of course be a black hole.
• If PQS is gone or re-implemented in a way that does not require procedural generation of scaledspace textures, we could even have a fully procedural galaxy with endless stars to explore. Even though it's procedural, it would still have the same seed for everyone, so every player would still have the same universe. Just like Mun's craters are procedural, but they're the same for every player.

What else could we do with the rich idea of interstellar travel?

• Super-powerful end-game drives such as Orion, NSWR, Fusion drives, Ramjets, and even spacetime warp drives. Also some other high technologies such as magnetic deflectors for space debris, fusion reactors, and antimatter tech.
• Much higher timewarp values once past the outer solar system planets.
• Large radio or smaller laser powered communications systems.
• Other playable star systems, maybe even capable of interacting with each other or existing in a single persistent universe? Little Green Men send probes to the Bugeyed Monster home system, and then the Bugeyed Monsters send their spaceships to examine the Little Green Men probe. End result: Science for both space programs.
  • A homeworld orbiting a gas giant, similar to Alternis Kerbol or New Horizons.
  • The real world solar system with Earth and Mars and Jupiter and stuff?
  • A super-kerbin homeworld, or KSP: Hard Mode. A planet a little larger than Eve, but more hospitable.
  • A Duna-like homeworld.
  • A homeworld on a planet or moon with little to no atmosphere.
  • A planet rather smaller than Kerbin, but with vastly inferior technology. Not just rocket technology, but every technology. Basically, a steampunk space program.
• Naturally occurring wormholes for transportation between regions of space.

I think an interstellar travel update should best be made as an expansion pack to the game, not an update to the core game.

[Pthigrivi]

45 minutes ago, GregroxMun said:

Things I'd like to have before adding more solar systems:

• Revamp the Stock Kerbol System.
• Overhaul the terrain system. PQS is definitely not the best.
• Planet discovery.
• Either principia-style N-Body orbits or SigmaBinary style binary orbits for stars.

 

 

I do like that revamp man. I would add to that list surface features, graphic enhancements, giving some love to the science system, finishing the experience system, adding a main quest and a lot of other stuff before we got a new solar system.

[Drelam]

13 hours ago, Tex_NL said:

There is no other way of looking at it!

Not very convincing....

Of course there are other ways to look at it apart form your perspective.

Other game developers constantly add content to their games while doing bugfixes in the mean time.

Both things don't exclude each other.

 

You can't expect a game to be 100% bug free before any content gets added and there will always be someone complaining about this or that which isn't perfect in their eyes.

 

I think people should be allowed to speculate and talk about the possibilities of the far future of KSP as a game.

 

5 hours ago, GregroxMun said:

There's a lot of possibilities for some interesting solar systems out there in the galaxy. So yes, KSP should eventually have more than the stock system. However, I think the stock system should be finished first. It needs interesting things to do on planets, and more things that set the planets apart from one another. Before jumping into adding more solar systems, we need the following:

• Three outer gas planets, along the lines of Outer Planets Mod. Each with a system of at least three major (spherical due to gravity) moons.
• Clouds. A major distinctive feature of those worlds in the universe that have atmospheres is the variation of clouds. They can spice up two otherwise very similar worlds. Think about how different a cloudless planet Eve looks from a cloud-covered planet Eve? While the E.V.E. Plugin's method of having cloud textures for each planet works fine, a procedural generated cloud system may look much better, being able to simulate the moving and changing weather patterns of the gas planets. (The clouds are, after all, the only distinctive visual feature)
• Things to do on planets. Be it a better simulation of geological (planetological) science, a colonization system, farming, mining, or even setting up a space center on the surface of the other planets, we need something to actually do once we get to a planet.
• Things that make individual planets interesting. Things like wind on atmospheric planets (including Eve), rain storms on Kerbin and Laythe, lightning on Jool, a hotter atmosphere for Eve, and dust storms on Duna. Things like gossamer rings and gas torus around Laythe's orbit of Jool, a magnetic field of radiation around Jool, cryovolcanoes on Vall and Eeloo. Volcanoes on Laythe.
• And of course, perhaps most importantly, make the game stable first! Fix the bugs, and please please please do not release based upon arbitrary deadlines no matter the state of the game.

Things I'd like to have before adding more solar systems:

• Revamp the Stock Kerbol System.
• Overhaul the terrain system. PQS is definitely not the best.
• Planet discovery.
• Either principia-style N-Body orbits or SigmaBinary style binary orbits for stars.

Now, with that out of the way, what sorts of other star systems could we have added?

• All stars are in the local Kerbol star cluster.
• An Analogue of Alpha Centauri system. A nearby system with two stars, a couple of hard-to-detect planets, and a red dwarf star orbiting them both.
• An analogue of the TRAPPIST-1 system. A small red dwarf with a couple of fat Io-like planets and a tidally-locked Laythe-like planet. (One side is Laythe-like, the other side is Europa-Like) All in a very compact set of orbits that bring the first two objects larger to each other in the sky than the moon in our sky. Compact red dwarf systems are basically just Jovian-type moon systems with a red dwarf star instead of a gas giant planet at the center.
• A blue giant star with a couple of scorched inner planets (the innermost planet vaporizing into space) and a couple of warm outer gas planets.
• A P-Type Binary system where the planets orbit around two stars.
• An S-Type Binary System with a large, but low mass red supergiant star orbiting a white giant star. Planets throughout the system, orbiting either star and one outer planet orbiting the barycenter.
• An analogue of the star system from Interstellar.
• And plenty more ideas where that came from.
• One or two rogue planets.
• A brown dwarf system.
• A few black holes. Larger ones might have stars orbiting them. The galactic core would of course be a black hole.
• If PQS is gone or re-implemented in a way that does not require procedural generation of scaledspace textures, we could even have a fully procedural galaxy with endless stars to explore. Even though it's procedural, it would still have the same seed for everyone, so every player would still have the same universe. Just like Mun's craters are procedural, but they're the same for every player.

What else could we do with the rich idea of interstellar travel?

• Super-powerful end-game drives such as Orion, NSWR, Fusion drives, Ramjets, and even spacetime warp drives. Also some other high technologies such as magnetic deflectors for space debris, fusion reactors, and antimatter tech.
• Much higher timewarp values once past the outer solar system planets.
• Large radio or smaller laser powered communications systems.
• Other playable star systems, maybe even capable of interacting with each other or existing in a single persistent universe? Little Green Men send probes to the Bugeyed Monster home system, and then the Bugeyed Monsters send their spaceships to examine the Little Green Men probe. End result: Science for both space programs.
  • A homeworld orbiting a gas giant, similar to Alternis Kerbol or New Horizons.
  • The real world solar system with Earth and Mars and Jupiter and stuff?
  • A super-kerbin homeworld, or KSP: Hard Mode. A planet a little larger than Eve, but more hospitable.
  • A Duna-like homeworld.
  • A homeworld on a planet or moon with little to no atmosphere.
  • A planet rather smaller than Kerbin, but with vastly inferior technology. Not just rocket technology, but every technology. Basically, a steampunk space program.
• Naturally occurring wormholes for transportation between regions of space.

I think an interstellar travel update should best be made as an expansion pack to the game, not an update to the core game.

This would be extremely awesome!