New Asteroid Types

[Whirligig Girl]

With the advent of new asteroid types in the form of the old Magic Boulder for KSP 1.1.3, I think the system can be improved upon to create an even more interesting asteroid system, one that might make asteroids really fun to play with!

Each different type of asteroid would have different science reports, different spawn points, different compositions/densities, and different colors. Mods could also take advantage of these different types (maybe you could mine uranium fuel or metal ore from metallic asteroids using certain mods.)

Size Types

Rename sizes from letter designation to a number designation

• Size 1: Asteroids no larger than 6m in diameter
• Size 2: Asteroids between 6 and 10 meters in diameter.
• Size 3: Asteroids between 10 and 17 meters in diameter.
• Size 4: Asteroids between 17 and 25 meters in diameter.
• Size 5: Asteroids between 25 and 50 meters in diameter. (Very rare)

Composition Types

Types include composition, density, and color as their defining characteristics, and are primarily based upon the spectral types.

• C-type: These are dark, carbon-rich asteroids which make up a significant part of the Near Kerbin Asteroid Belt. They have a relatively low density, and have decently high ore. They range from dark grey to dark brown in color.
• E-type: These are dull purple/pink objects found very rarely around Eve.
• G-type: C-type asteroids with lighter color, lower density, and more ice. These are higher in Ore content and they are much less dense. They are somewhat rare, but they make up the bulk of the Dresteroid Belt. They range from light grey to medium-grey in color.
• S-type: These are lighter, browner asteroids similar in color and composition to Gilly, These are stony in composition, and contain some ices and ore. They are quite common around the near Kerbin belt, and make up a significant portion of the Main Asteroid Belt. They can occasionally be seen orbiting Eve or Duna as captured asteroids (very rarely). They range from dark brown to dull red in color.
• M-type: These are shiny, metallic asteroids. They are incredibly dense, hold little to no water or ore, and can be recovered on Kerbin for quite a large sum of money. They are found in the main belt, but also appear in the Vulcanoid asteroid belt below Moho. They are shiny grey in color.
• Comet: These are mostly icy, with some organic compounds. These are the leftovers from the solar system's formation, and have a high science value. They appear on inclined, eccentric, and high orbits around the sun. They range from dark grey to grey in color, and have comet tails. They also tend to be much larger.
• Minmoids: These are very rare, near-Kerbin-objects which share a similar composition with Minmus. (But, like, not pudding or ice cream)
• Mystery-type: These strange objects appear only in 90 or 270 degree inclined orbits around Ike. They are very rare, and very valuable. Just, you know, don't taunt it.
• Icy-Type: These objects are icy with some silicates and organic compounds. They range from dark brown to yellow-orange in color, and can be found orbiting Jool very far out, or orbiting near Jool or Eeloo.

Structure Types

• Rubble Pile: Objects held together very loosely, with a very low impact tolerance. They are very low density, and are the easiest to transport. (as long as gee-forces are kept in check)
• Solid: Objects which are decently well packed together. Much denser, much stronger.

 

Location Types

• Sub-Moho Belt: Objects with semi-major-axes significantly less than that of Moho. Almost exclusively M-type metallic asteroids.
• Near-Eve Belt: A very sparsely packed belt of objects near Eve. Primarily contains the Gilly-like S-type asteroids and the purplish E-type asteroids.
• Eve Orbit: Very very very rarely, an S-type asteroid might show up orbiting Eve as a sort of mini-Gilly.
• Near-Kerbin Belt: A decently packed region of objects similar to Gilly and Minmus, as well as plenty of stones and carbonaceous iceballs.
• Duna Orbit: Very very very rarely, an S-type, C-type, or G-type asteroid might show up orbiting Duna, very rarely.
• Magic Boulder: Polar orbits around Ike, from 12-25km, where Magic Boulders can spawn.
• Main Belt: A large region of space with asteroids of many types, ranging from near the orbit of Duna to near the orbit of Jool.
• Dresteroids: a belt of G-type asteroids orbiting Dres, with similar composition to Dres itself.
• Near-Jool-Belt: Objects orbiting the sun near Jool that are made of similar stuff to Jool's moons.
• Irregular Jool Satellites: Objects in distant orbits around Jool itself.
• Transjoolean Objects: Objects with orbits in resonance with Jool's orbit, composed of similar stuff as Eeloo and Jool's moons.
• Comets: Objects in distant, inclined, high orbits around the Sun.

[Matuchkin]

Personally, I believe we should have rocks that are kilometres across, and have a sphere of influence.

[Whirligig Girl]

10 hours ago, Matuchkin said:

Personally, I believe we should have rocks that are kilometres across, and have a sphere of influence.

While procedurally generated asteroids using PQS and the celestial body system would be quite cool, it would also be very difficult to implement, as KSP wouldhave to export the scaledspace model and textures each time new asteroids were found. There's probably a workaround, or instance, maybe you generate the asteroid model not with PQS, but as a huge conventional model (just like asteroids already) and you center them on an empty celestial body with no terrain. For ScaledSpace, the planet could just re-use a small-scale version of that model. Or you could just have the game generate low-definition scaledspace maps of an asteroid that does have PQS, and wait a while whenever the textures need to be generated. 64x32 textures for a 5km object would be reasonable.

Edited June 24, 2016 by GregroxMun