Nebula?

[Newgame space program]

Do you think that a couple updates after the game comes out they may add nebula that you can go to in which you actually deal with aerodynamic affects? (I got the idea from shadowzone)

[Pthigrivi]

1 hour ago, Newgame space program said:

Do you think that a couple updates after the game comes out they may add nebula that you can go to in which you actually deal with aerodynamic affects? (I got the idea from shadowzone)

My understanding is that Nebulae are surprisingly rarified, very near vacuum compared to any planetary atmosphere, even Pluto's. So there wouldn't be any noticeable aerodynamic effect. They're also huge--often 10's and sometimes hundreds of light-years across. That said they'd be beautiful to see in game, and might be relevant to bussard collectors:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bussard_ramjet

Edited January 10, 2022 by Pthigrivi

[The Aziz]

Yeah I don't think any sort of nebula/gas blob dense enough to cause aerodynamic effects would even exist as a separate object.

[intelliCom]

Here's a more realistic idea: Drag from the matter ejected in a comet tail? At least the movement of the tail pushing a spacecraft away from it?

[problemecium]

More importantly we have scale to consider. Space fantasy media often portray nebulae (that's the plural for "nebula" btw) as these small, dense things into a which a ship can quickly duck if it needs to hide, but in reality a nebula is a huge, diffuse thing typically many light years across that can contain thousands of entire star systems within itself. Thus, if all of KSP2 is set within a small, close-knit cluster of stars, a single nebula would easily contain the entire playable volume.

EVE Online (the MMO, not the KSP mod. Ignore the automatic tooltip) does a relatively good job with nebulae IMO, portraying each major faction's territory as corresponding to a nebula subtly tinted their favorite colors. As you jump between neighboring star systems, you move between slightly different positions near or within one of the nebulae.

Technically nebulae do provide drag, but this is all but undetectable unless moving at interstellar speeds and only a major consideration if traveling at relativistic speeds. KSP2 stands a decent chance of providing fusion torches that can do a few percent of light speed, at which point drag becomes a subtle thing that one could understand glossing over. For us to really get concerned about it would imply we're trying to drive around with Kugelblitz engines or photon engines, which I'm not counting on KSP2 having in the stock game (hecc, I haven't even heard of any mod that has ever provided these in all the years KSP has existed).

P.S. Also I'm not an expert on this but I would surmise that stellar wind would clear out the space within a system until it's of a similar density to that in our own Solar system, whether the system is surrounded by a nebula or not.

Edited January 11, 2022 by problemecium
EnvironmentalVisualEnhancements Online?

[Brandon10044]

On 1/11/2022 at 8:51 AM, problemecium said:

More importantly we have scale to consider. Space fantasy media often portray nebulae (that's the plural for "nebula" btw) as these small, dense things into a which a ship can quickly duck if it needs to hide, but in reality a nebula is a huge, diffuse thing typically many light years across that can contain thousands of entire star systems within itself. Thus, if all of KSP2 is set within a small, close-knit cluster of stars, a single nebula would easily contain the entire playable volume.

EVE Online (the MMO, not the KSP mod. Ignore the automatic tooltip) does a relatively good job with nebulae IMO, portraying each major faction's territory as corresponding to a nebula subtly tinted their favorite colors. As you jump between neighboring star systems, you move between slightly different positions near or within one of the nebulae.

Technically nebulae do provide drag, but this is all but undetectable unless moving at interstellar speeds and only a major consideration if traveling at relativistic speeds. KSP2 stands a decent chance of providing fusion torches that can do a few percent of light speed, at which point drag becomes a subtle thing that one could understand glossing over. For us to really get concerned about it would imply we're trying to drive around with Kugelblitz engines or photon engines, which I'm not counting on KSP2 having in the stock game (hecc, I haven't even heard of any mod that has ever provided these in all the years KSP has existed).

P.S. Also I'm not an expert on this but I would surmise that stellar wind would clear out the space within a system until it's of a similar density to that in our own Solar system, whether the system is surrounded by a nebula or not.

Yeah, nebulae more than likely won't be of issue in terms of effects on spacecraft, even with engines that provide enough thrust for at a few percent of lightspeed. It would be cool, though, if nebulae were implemented for resource or colony expansion, such as a way to collect resources to refine for our colonies or as a fuel source for our ships. Not to be rude. 

Edited January 12, 2022 by Brandon10044

[Pthigrivi]

5 minutes ago, Brandon10044 said:

Yeah, nebulae more than likely won't be of issue in terms of effects on spacecraft, even with engines that for at a few percent of lightspeed. It would be cool, though, if nebulae were implemented for resource or colony expansion, such as a way to collect resources to refine for our colonies or as a fuel source for our ships. Not to be rude. 

A DLC with solar sails, Bussard ramjets, beamed energy, etc. I just started playing with the Space Dust mod and there are some cool ideas there.

Edited January 12, 2022 by Pthigrivi

[Brandon10044]

3 minutes ago, Pthigrivi said:

A DLC with solar sails, Bussard ramjets, beamed energy, etc. 

That would be cool! 

[sciencecompliance]

On 1/9/2022 at 5:21 PM, The Aziz said:

Yeah I don't think any sort of nebula/gas blob dense enough to cause aerodynamic effects would even exist as a separate object.

And probably wouldn't exist anywhere but on/above the surface of a massive body like a planet, as pressure in a gas will quickly push the particles away from each other without a force like gravity holding them together.

[Nazalassa]

On 1/11/2022 at 2:51 PM, problemecium said:

a single nebula would easily contain the entire playable volume.

Cool!

Imagine the skybox just being a fuzzy dark blue mess. One less thing to worry about for devs! 

[Bej Kerman]

On 1/9/2022 at 11:46 PM, Newgame space program said:

Do you think that a couple updates after the game comes out they may add nebula that you can go to in which you actually deal with aerodynamic affects? (I got the idea from shadowzone)

"You've been watching too much Star Trek!"
A nebula isn't much denser than the non-existent interstellar gas around it. No aerodynamic changes whatsoever.

[SciMan]

The only way I can think of to get atmospheric effects in (almost) zero g, is if you have some gigantic construction that contains a pressurized atmosphere, in orbit around a star.
Now bear in mind, this isn't something that would happen naturally the way you might get a "waterworld" or gas giant. Gas giants and water worlds have their own gravitational fields around them, the thing I'm thinking of does not have enough mass to cause a gravity field that would be strong enough to do much other than perhaps cause debris to accumulate in the center over time (and that's only if the motion of the air mass doesn't disturb such a collection of debris). I'm thinking the maximum self-gravitation of just the air mass alone would have to create an acceleration of less than 0.005 m/s² to count as being "still dominated by aerodynamic rather than gravitational forces".
Now mind you that still means you could make a really dang big structure, easily visible in the sky of another planet.

Basically, what I'm thinking of is a pair of gigantic transparent hemispherical domes, welded together to make a sphere, and filled with an atmosphere.
And here's the kicker, it would have a diameter of at least 1000 kilometers. This would be a very large megastructure, easily visible from other planets in the same solar system (and giving all kinds of interesting chemical spectrographic readings to telescopes in other nearby solar systems).

Birds (or more likely "air fish" since that body plan would also work with no gravity to contend with) would likely be the primary form of animal life found in such a megastructure, but their eggs would likely have some form of sticky substance on the shell so that they could be affixed in a cluster to some surface, be that a "tree" (that would be spherical instead of linear) or a floating bush, or whatever other plant or animal or just the wall of the structure itself the creature happens to be near when it attempts to find a place to make a nest (if it even needs a nest, but that's likely since most all forms of multi-cellular animal life can make use of shelter from time to time).

Such a megastructure would be an incredible place to visit, however if Kerbals didn't build it, it would pretty much PROVE the existence of alien (to the Kerbals) life, and as such would be an EXTREMELY important scientific discovery.

[Davi SDF]

Even though in the KSP universe, planets can be as (if not more) dense as Uranium, i think Nebulas are too sparse and "undense" to have any noticeable effec on your ship.

However, they would be great for harvesting some Hydrogen, and perhaps, Deuterium or Tritium.

 

52 minutes ago, SciMan said:

The only way I can think of to get atmospheric effects in (almost) zero g, is if you have some gigantic construction that contains a pressurized atmosphere, in orbit around a star.
Now bear in mind, this isn't something that would happen naturally the way you might get a "waterworld" or gas giant. Gas giants and water worlds have their own gravitational fields around them, the thing I'm thinking of does not have enough mass to cause a gravity field that would be strong enough to do much other than perhaps cause debris to accumulate in the center over time (and that's only if the motion of the air mass doesn't disturb such a collection of debris). I'm thinking the maximum self-gravitation of just the air mass alone would have to create an acceleration of less than 0.005 m/s² to count as being "still dominated by aerodynamic rather than gravitational forces".
Now mind you that still means you could make a really dang big structure, easily visible in the sky of another planet.

Basically, what I'm thinking of is a pair of gigantic transparent hemispherical domes, welded together to make a sphere, and filled with an atmosphere.
And here's the kicker, it would have a diameter of at least 1000 kilometers. This would be a very large megastructure, easily visible from other planets in the same solar system (and giving all kinds of interesting chemical spectrographic readings to telescopes in other nearby solar systems).

Birds (or more likely "air fish" since that body plan would also work with no gravity to contend with) would likely be the primary form of animal life found in such a megastructure, but their eggs would likely have some form of sticky substance on the shell so that they could be affixed in a cluster to some surface, be that a "tree" (that would be spherical instead of linear) or a floating bush, or whatever other plant or animal or just the wall of the structure itself the creature happens to be near when it attempts to find a place to make a nest (if it even needs a nest, but that's likely since most all forms of multi-cellular animal life can make use of shelter from time to time).

Such a megastructure would be an incredible place to visit, however if Kerbals didn't build it, it would pretty much PROVE the existence of alien (to the Kerbals) life, and as such would be an EXTREMELY important scientific discovery.

I think the ammount of gasses nescessary to fill those spheres with 1 atm pressure would be enough to probably destroy the glass. I could be very wrong though.

Edited April 26, 2022 by Davi SDF
read more carefully, gravity is accounted.

[SciMan]

Who said it had to be glass? Just because it's transparent doesn't mean it's glass. Even if it is glass, it could be high-strength tempered glass (or just fused silica) reinforced with carbon nanotubes or something equally incredibly strong and lightweight.

Just because a glass you drink from shatters when you drop it, doesn't mean glass itself as a material is week. Brittle yes, but NOT weak at all.
I mean fiberglass is literally just regular glass spun into a fiber, and yet it's one of the stronger materials we know of.

EDIT: Oh yeah, and champagne bottles are made of glass too. They have to contain significantly more than 1 atmosphere of pressure, yet they do not fail at the drop of a hat. So clearly glass is not a weak material.

EDIT 2: Additionally, if you DO find you need a material stronger than glass that is still transparent, you could conceivably make the hemispheres out of artificially grown Diamond crystal panes. And there's not a single soul out there that will say a Diamond is weak (except at very specific angles, which could easily be reinforced by carbon nanotubes).
Basically, you could make the whole thing out of a whole lot of Carbon, provided you have nanotechnology.

Edited April 26, 2022 by SciMan

[Pthigrivi]

Noticed this during some casual reading on Supernova remnants:

“An SNR passes through the following stages as it expands:

…

3. Cooling of the shell, to form a thin (< 1 pc), dense (1 to 100 million atoms per cubic metre) shell surrounding the hot (few million kelvin) interior. This is the pressure-driven snowplow phase. The shell can be clearly seen in optical emission from recombining ionized hydrogen and ionized oxygen atoms.”

Which if my math is right means a few hundred years following a supernova there are shell regions ~3 light years thick with densities similar to the upper ionosphere. Course you’d also probably be vaporized by gamma rays, but cool nonetheless. 

Edited May 5, 2022 by Pthigrivi