Planet 8 Discussion

[GoldForest]

So, there's been speculation going around that we're getting a new planet or planetoid or something in the Kerbolor system in KSP 2. 

I'd like to hear your thoughts on the matter. Do you think Planet 8 is Gas Planet 2? Do you think it's a new highly elliptical orbiting ice planet? 

[Missingno200]

That's actually a cool idea for environmental story telling. Having a rogue Deb Deb planet captured in Kerbol's orbit could send Kerbals on their interstellar journey to learn more about Deb Deb.

[coyotesfrontier]

I think it will be a super earth, either with an atmosphere or without.

Another gas giant would be treading too much familiar ground with Jool, as well as being another planet you can't land on. It would also be a way to ease players into the world of high-gravity planets like Ovin.

[GoldForest]

1 hour ago, coyotesfrontier said:

I think it will be a super earth, either with an atmosphere or without.

Another gas giant would be treading too much familiar ground with Jool, as well as being another planet you can't land on. It would also be a way to ease players into the world of high-gravity planets like Ovin.

Nah, Gas Planet 2 would give us more moons. I'd rather have a gas giant with more moons than one single planet with a single moon. Besides, if they add rings to GP2, it will make it much more difficult to navigate. Tons of stuff they could do with a new gas giant. 

Eve has high gravity, so we don't really need a high gravity, though high gravity comes with super earth territory. 

[Vl3d]

It makes no sense for it to be a gas giant and not have been discovered by now. If there is a new planet, it's something small and very cold.

[magnemoe]

2 minutes ago, Vl3d said:

It makes no sense for it to be a gas giant and not have been discovered by now. If there is a new planet, it's something small and very cold.

Agree,  however as I understand its no changes the the kerbin solar system except a better looking planets.  
But having an small as in Eeloo or smaller planet far out say 10 times Jool orbit would be nice. 

[GoldForest]

28 minutes ago, Vl3d said:

It makes no sense for it to be a gas giant and not have been discovered by now. If there is a new planet, it's something small and very cold.

It could be a gas giant with a highly large and highly elliptical orbit, making it impossible to detect until it was practically next to Eeloo. 

I mean, look at the Nemesis theory, which by the way holds LOTS of evidence. Most star systems are binary star systems, so where's our second star? The common theory is that it's orbit is so big that we won't ever see it until it's right next to Pluto. 

Also, it's not like KSP 1's solar system is truly locked in stone. I mean, KSP 1 is unfinished. Having a second gas giant wouldn't be too far out of the realm of possibility. 

[Vl3d]

44 minutes ago, GoldForest said:

Most star systems are binary star systems, so where's our second star? The common theory is that it's orbit is so big that we won't ever see it until it's right next to Pluto. 

That makes 0 sense.

[Bej Kerman]

49 minutes ago, GoldForest said:

Most star systems are binary star systems, so where's our second star?

They said most star systems are binary. They never said all star systems are binary

[GoldForest]

11 minutes ago, Vl3d said:

That makes 0 sense.

It makes total sense if you think about it. A red dwarf is very dim. And if it's orbit is literally a lightyear and a half wide, we would only see it for a few hundred years every 26 million years.

Nemesis (hypothetical star) - Wikipedia

 

5 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

They said most star systems are binary. They never said all star systems are binary

True, but again, most could be 99% or 51%. IIRC, most in the case of binary stars is closer to 99% than 51%

Edited January 12, 2023 by GoldForest

[Vl3d]

21 minutes ago, GoldForest said:

A red dwarf is very dim. And if it's orbit is literally a lightyear and a half wide, we would only see it for a few hundred years every 26 million years.

Nemesis (hypothetical star) - Wikipedia

"Using newer and more powerful infrared telescope technology which is able to detect brown dwarfs as cool as 150 kelvins out to a distance of 10 light-years from the Sun, the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE survey) has not detected Nemesis. In 2011, David Morrison, a senior scientist at NASA known for his work in risk assessment of near Earth objects, has written that there is no confidence in the existence of an object like Nemesis, since it should have been detected in infrared sky surveys."

Let's just move on...

[GoldForest]

5 minutes ago, Vl3d said:

"Using newer and more powerful infrared telescope technology which is able to detect brown dwarfs as cool as 150 kelvins out to a distance of 10 light-years from the Sun, the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE survey) has not detected Nemesis. In 2011, David Morrison, a senior scientist at NASA known for his work in risk assessment of near Earth objects, has written that there is no confidence in the existence of an object like Nemesis, since it should have been detected in infrared sky surveys."

Let's just move on...

There are billions of objects in the sky, it's easy to miss one red dwarf. I will admit that the existence of Nemesis is remote, but it's still not zero. WISE might not be able to find it, but some random astronomer with a telescope might. I mean, we barely detect asteroids that are RIGHT next to Earth!

Anyway, the KSP 2 team could have put a Nemesis like star in the Kerbolar system. It's totally possible. 

[magnemoe]

22 minutes ago, Vl3d said:

"Using newer and more powerful infrared telescope technology which is able to detect brown dwarfs as cool as 150 kelvins out to a distance of 10 light-years from the Sun, the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE survey) has not detected Nemesis. In 2011, David Morrison, a senior scientist at NASA known for his work in risk assessment of near Earth objects, has written that there is no confidence in the existence of an object like Nemesis, since it should have been detected in infrared sky surveys."

Let's just move on...

This, and it put limits on the hypothetical planet 9, its not an gas giant as we would seen that. An super earth or smaller ice giant could avoid detection. 
 

13 minutes ago, GoldForest said:

There are billions of objects in the sky, it's easy to miss one red dwarf. I will admit that the existence of Nemesis is remote, but it's still not zero. WISE might not be able to find it, but some random astronomer with a telescope might. I mean, we barely detect asteroids that are RIGHT next to Earth!

Anyway, the KSP 2 team could have put a Nemesis like star in the Kerbolar system. It's totally possible. 

Except if you watch for some time and notice thigs who move.  Yes you will need to do this multiple times to be sure.  
Small asteroids are harder to detect as they are small, still we are pretty sure is no large dinosaur killer size asteroids who can impact earth the next hundred years. 

The KSP developers could obviously add something.  They have said they would not change the solar system with Kerbin however. 

Edited January 12, 2023 by magnemoe

[TheTennesseeFireman]

I voted ice giant (feels odd to not have one of these represented in the Kerbin system) and rogue planet, but I’d be happy with any of these. I don’t personally care too much about keeping to the canon of this “this planet was undiscovered in KSP”, just that it’s a fun place to visit if indeed it is real.

[Drakenred65]

One of the theory’s about it I’ve seen thinks it’s surface would make it resemble a super comet, as a significantly greater than earth mass object should still have enough heat to have made it visible in most infrared scans, unless it had a deep ice cover, however that’s not to say it’s a super comet,  just ice covered to a considerable depth.

 

 

 

Edited January 12, 2023 by Drakenred65

[GoldForest]

So as of right now, "Nuptune like planet" (Yes, I realized I misspelled it) is leading the pack in first, followed by Dwarf Planet in second and then Captured Rogue Planet in third. 

Hmmm, having a ice giant with a thick gas atmosphere would be a welcome challenge. A sort of super sized Eve.

I'm kind of against the idea of a dwarf planet, since Eeloo exists and fills that void well enough.

Captured Rogue Planet would definitely be interesting, and quite lore friendly. 

[SciMan]

Where's the option in the poll for "they're not putting a new planet in the game"?

Because that's my vote that I'm writing in.

Why do I think that? This is based on baseless speculation.
A logical argument like proposing the addition of another planet to the Kerbol solar system may be logically self consistent, but if the foundational assumptions of the argument are wrong the whole thing is rendered invalid anyways.

And I think the foundational assumption of "I heard someone say somewhere it's gonna do the thing" is not a sound foundation for any kind of logic. Especially since nobody's quoting sources.
I'm also relatively if we DO quote sources I'm betting it's gonna be @Vl3d or another person that is NOT A DEVELOPER on the forums who has earned a reputation of not keeping their expectations in check, and the source quoted will be just them stating things they'd like to see as if they ARE ALREADY CONFIRMED (when they're not), rather than staying grounded on the facts that we KNOW and CAN ACTUALLY CONFIRM about what is and what is not going to be in KSP 2.

Sorry if that ends this topic, but hey. This is not just an unknown, it's an unknown unknown. We don't even know the extent of the things we don't know about KSP 2.
So it's useless to go off on a long speculative argument when the whole foundation of the argument is based on a lack of knowledge.

EDIT: Put in shorter terms, as far as the soundness of the logic expressed so far in favor of a new planet in the Kerbol system, and what evidence there is to base that on, everyone in favor of it so far is basically trying to build a skyscraper (a very long and detailed logical argument) on a known patch of quicksand (we KNOW we don't know anything about the subject in question).

Edited January 13, 2023 by SciMan

[Bej Kerman]

19 minutes ago, SciMan said:

Where's the option in the poll for "they're not putting a new planet in the game"?

Because that's my vote that I'm writing in.

20 minutes ago, SciMan said:

I'm also relatively if we DO quote sources I'm betting it's gonna be @Vl3d or another person that is NOT A DEVELOPER on the forums who has earned a reputation of not keeping their expectations in check

These bits I understood. The rest...

20 minutes ago, SciMan said:

Why do I think that? This is based on baseless speculation.
A logical argument like proposing the addition of another planet to the Kerbol solar system may be logically self consistent, but if the foundational assumptions of the argument are wrong the whole thing is rendered invalid anyways.

And I think the foundational assumption of "I heard someone say somewhere it's gonna do the thing" is not a sound foundation for any kind of logic. Especially since nobody's quoting sources.

...eh?

One of the scenes is literally Kerbals in front of a diagram of a hypothetical planet, one that if implemented, would be an analogue to a real case for a hypothetical 9th planet.

[GoldForest]

2 hours ago, SciMan said:

Where's the option in the poll for "they're not putting a new planet in the game"?

Because that's my vote that I'm writing in.

Why do I think that? This is based on baseless speculation.
A logical argument like proposing the addition of another planet to the Kerbol solar system may be logically self consistent, but if the foundational assumptions of the argument are wrong the whole thing is rendered invalid anyways.

And I think the foundational assumption of "I heard someone say somewhere it's gonna do the thing" is not a sound foundation for any kind of logic. Especially since nobody's quoting sources.
I'm also relatively if we DO quote sources I'm betting it's gonna be @Vl3d or another person that is NOT A DEVELOPER on the forums who has earned a reputation of not keeping their expectations in check, and the source quoted will be just them stating things they'd like to see as if they ARE ALREADY CONFIRMED (when they're not), rather than staying grounded on the facts that we KNOW and CAN ACTUALLY CONFIRM about what is and what is not going to be in KSP 2.

Sorry if that ends this topic, but hey. This is not just an unknown, it's an unknown unknown. We don't even know the extent of the things we don't know about KSP 2.
So it's useless to go off on a long speculative argument when the whole foundation of the argument is based on a lack of knowledge.

EDIT: Put in shorter terms, as far as the soundness of the logic expressed so far in favor of a new planet in the Kerbol system, and what evidence there is to base that on, everyone in favor of it so far is basically trying to build a skyscraper (a very long and detailed logical argument) on a known patch of quicksand (we KNOW we don't know anything about the subject in question).

Why would I put that option in the poll when the title itself is "If Planet 8 is real..."? 

Baseless speculation? These sepculations aren't baseless. They're far-fetched, yes, but not baseless. There's that one screenshot of an object on a developer's screen that looks like it is in an orbit outside of Eeloo's orbit. 

I'm not quoting any sources, mostly because I can't remember where to find the speculative screenshot, that's why I invited discussion about the eighth planet on the assumption it is real, to see what people think. This thread is made with the assumption that planet 8 is real and encourages discussion of planet 8 as if it were that, real and coming to KSP 2. 

It's not outside the realm of possibility that Intercept Games has indeed expanded the Kerbolor system and has done a heck of a job keeping it quiet. Hell, they could introduce 50 new planets to the Kerbolar system. Is it ridiculous to think that? Maybe. Does it hurt to speculate about them adding 50 new planets to the Kerbolor system? No. Definitely not.  This is just all good healthy speculation. If you don't want to speculate, you don't aave to, ignore this thread. 

Hell, I just call it planet 8, but really I'm just curious as to what people think this mysterious object supposedly outside of Eeloo's orbit is. Comet? Rogue Planet? I want to know what people think. 

[obney kerman]

I'd been thinking of it as a large rocky planet, as in the original concept for KSP's "story", but an ice giant would be interesting too, and it'd bring a whole host of new moons to explore. Either way, I'm very excited to visit the (alleged) new planet.

[Minmus Taster]

It would be cool to have gas planet 2 be orbited by the super earth but that's just a pipe dream I'm sure.

[Strawberry]

My ideal setup is one gas planet 2 (and move eeloo more outwards), and one super far out rogue planet, itd just make the kerbol system feel much more alive.

[tstein]

On 1/12/2023 at 8:12 AM, GoldForest said:

There are billions of objects in the sky, it's easy to miss one red dwarf. I will admit that the existence of Nemesis is remote, but it's still not zero. WISE might not be able to find it, but some random astronomer with a telescope might. I mean, we barely detect asteroids that are RIGHT next to Earth!

Anyway, the KSP 2 team could have put a Nemesis like star in the Kerbolar system. It's totally possible. 

Well asteroids have  ZERO  self generated energy, that makes a huge difference.  Even a brown dwarf has IR emissions .  Anything that small   to not be detected  has even larger chances of have been eaten by the sun  billions of years ago.

[Drakenred65]

Technically some asteroids (4Vesta definitely ) at one point had a molten core and mantle, and 16 psyche apparently had iron volcanism at one point according to some theory’s,

 

but generally most current temperatures are below 30c 

[SSTO Crasher]

I  think an ice giant like Neptune would be pretty cool