A destroyable/transformable landscape without voxels. Old as DOS.

[kerbiloid]

 

[Creepi]

Since KSP's terrain is rendered using a height map + texture map, I believe that it could be possible.

But as with everything it's a matter of performance and 'usefulness'

[steuben]

Actually it's more an issue of raw data volume. This suggestion and its kin are an artefact of the failure of the human mind to judge scales. Planets are large... almost eldritchly large.

 

Let's assume that we are using a surface resolution of one square meter.  The surface area of Kerbin is 4.5238934×10¹² m², 4.5 trillion square meters. Assuming that the data required for each point can be packed into one byte, that means it will take about 4.5 TiB to store Kerbin. And it gets worse with the the square of the radius. Assuming it compresses well you are still looking at around 2 TiB to store _one_ planet let alone any others.

[MKI]

30 minutes ago, steuben said:

Let's assume that we are using a surface resolution of one square meter.  The surface area of Kerbin is 4.5238934×10¹² m², 4.5 trillion square meters. Assuming that the data required for each point can be packed into one byte, that means it will take about 4.5 TiB to store Kerbin. And it gets worse with the the square of the radius. Assuming it compresses well you are still looking at around 2 TiB to store _one_ planet let alone any others.

This assumes you save all the terrain as-is. If you only save terrain data that has been changed from the default seed you end up with much much much less. Unless of course you plan on exploding rockets over the entire surface of the planet, and KSP doesn't optimize anything ;D

 

 

[steuben]

True except... how are you storing the original shape of terrain?

But, given the nature of players, if it can be done it will be done, and players will gripe when it can't be done even though it can be done.

[MKI]

I believe the current "shape of terrain" is more or less generated from a random seed of data, so there isn't actually anything stored in the scale of the entire planets surface. This is true now, and would be true with deformation. I can see voxel deformation information being compressible to a similar degree, as each "hit" could be calculated base upon a set list of deformations. Obviously this information is saved somewhere, but I don't see it piling up to terabytes of data even if you did something as drastic as bombard all of Kerbin's surface. There's plenty of ways to "hack it" to make the data even more compressible, such as limiting the types of deformations to only a few types of impact shapes, and preventing new shapes from further deforming the terrain. 

 

I think its also worth mentioning that this sort of feature would be cool, but also a lot of work to do something you really shouldn't be doing in the first place. Stop hitting the ground, and learn how to fly! There's a lot out there to explore hahaha

 

 

[HvP]

I'd just be happy if there was a way to level the ground in a rectangular area large enough for a surface base.

[Dientus]

10 minutes ago, HvP said:

I'd just be happy if there was a way to level the ground in a rectangular area large enough for a surface base.

I am waiting to get details on colony building! I have soo many questions that only devs can answer.

 

[Bej Kerman]

On 8/9/2021 at 4:49 PM, steuben said:

Actually it's more an issue of raw data volume.

Let's not think in terms of 'how can we store as much unneeded data as possible' as Squad has done for the past decade, and instead consider that not every square inch of the planet has to be done at once.

[steuben]

Quote

consider that not every square inch of the planet has to be done at once.

Been there. Done that. Got the t-shirt, the mug, and collector's edition hat.

Proposals will be considered.

Edited October 1, 2021 by steuben

[ColdJ]

On 8/10/2021 at 8:41 AM, HvP said:

I'd just be happy if there was a way to level the ground in a rectangular area large enough for a surface base.

Hi. only just read this. I know it has been over a month since you posted but if you haven't already found out. You can use the map decal function in Kerbal Konstructs to make a flat space for your base. Map decals can also be used to deform the terrain into other shapes too. The changes you make will only apply as long as you have KK installed. Once the instances have been created it is best to keep them in a folder outside the KK folder but within the GameData folder as KK has quirk that sometimes shifts the coordinate data of instances that are stored within it's folder structure. Your newly created instances config files can be found in the newinstances folder within the KK folder.

[asap1]

would be very cool underground bases shielded from radiation underground caves just think of the possibilities.

also terrain editing parts would be great.