Star system effects

from Sins Forums
Hi guys, im not sure if this has been touched upon before but the star systems to me, dont really feel like, well a star system

when you view the system you dont get a sense that these planets and other bodies are in a system, they just seem to be random objects.

I got some suggestions I have come up with so far.

- Make the star on average bigger! much bigger, otherwise it just looks like a funky coloured planet - you want it to stand out as the middle of the system. maybe add a bigger gravity well and push the planets further away from it... as its a star! its holding all the planets in orbit! - I think this in itself will got along way with helping you identify the planets are in a system.

- solar flares? not just fancy effects from star, but what about random huge flares (one an hour?) which errupt from the star and slowly move out across the system (slowly) im sure there are lots of things you can guys can come up with so it can effect gameplay... (lose phase lanes?) sheilds reduced in the storm? planets effected when it hits them. This is a bit like that plasma storm effect you got in B3, but its just feels a bit randomly placed.

- Add some sort of star system wide effect like an asteroid belt that incirlces a couple of the planets nearest to the star on a different axis etc, like the ring effects you can get on the planets... this could be a mineable resource or have pockets of it which are, or just as an effect, that helps you visualise you are inside a system.

Here are some quick pics i found on the internets, note the size of our sun? and the system wide asterioid belt...



another one:



Now look at this bad boy. This is what I want to see in the middle of the system... also why do i get green stars? you cant have green, think white, orange to deep red. no other colours please



Sorry if this has already been mentioned. I think the game is great so far but for just atmopshere I think the game needs more visual indicators to tell the player that they are inside a star system, and are not fighting over planets lost in the void of space...

I hope you understand what im trying to say, just a way to visual link / group the system around the star, mainly because the planets appear static in their orbits for reasons already explained and with phase lines between the planets, it to me; breaks up the illusion they are in a system together.

ps.
sorry this post is a bit rushed
11,148 views 46 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top
- Make the star on average bigger! much bigger, otherwise it just looks like a funky coloured planet - you want it to stand out as the middle of the system. maybe add a bigger gravity well and push the planets further away from it... as its a star! its holding all the planets in orbit! - I think this in itself will got along way with helping you identify the planets are in a system.


FYI, stars and their associated grav wells are huge compared to other planetoids.
Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top
why do i get green stars?


I've asked that same question with no response. My guess is that its just one of those unanswerable mysteries of life.
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Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
No other COLORS ?!!?!?!?!??!?!?!
Its still SciFi, so we need purple Stars
Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
eh, purple stars would make chicks want to play it, and thats the LAST thing we need
Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top
Now look at this bad boy. This is what I want to see in the middle of the system... also why do i get green stars? you cant have green, think white, orange to deep red. no other colours please


Actually, it's entirely reasonable to call our sun a 'green' star. Blue is also a 'natural' color, fyi.
Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top
why do i get green stars?


I've asked that same question with no response. My guess is that its just one of those unanswerable mysteries of life.

stars do go big and blue (and green) usually right before they're about to go supernova (in the next ten or so thousand years)
Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top
stars do go big and blue (and green) usually right before they're about to go supernova (in the next ten or so thousand years)


They go big and *red* at that point (with a timeline dependent on size).

Blue is generally an indicator of a young, hot star.
Reply #8 from Sins Forums Top
Strange, i thought i posted here. Anyhow. it would be cool to see such effects, just no gamma ray ideas, id rather not see my home system vaporized by a beam of doom..well not from the star anyhow.
Reply #9 from Sins Forums Top
eh, purple stars would make chicks want to play it, and thats the LAST thing we need


why not? chicks are nice
Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top
no, chicks are evil. chicks LOOK nice, but if you cant see them, all you get is the evil.

NOTE: the song that goes "girls just wanna have fun" is inherently wrong! GUYS just wanna have fun, GIRLS want love and serious relationships
Reply #11 from Sins Forums Top
chicks why not
Reply #12 from Sins Forums Top

eh, purple stars would make chicks want to play it, and thats the LAST thing we need


anything that encourages girls to play a game I like, is fine with me! Purple Stars FTW!
Reply #13 from Sins Forums Top
- solar flares? not just fancy effects from star, but what about random huge flares (one an hour?) which errupt from the star and slowly move out across the system (slowly) im sure there are lots of things you can guys can come up with so it can effect gameplay... (lose phase lanes?) sheilds reduced in the storm? planets effected when it hits them. This is a bit like that plasma storm effect you got in B3, but its just feels a bit randomly placed.


why has no one yet commented on this idea??? THIS IS A GREAT IDEA! I LOVE IT! there is so much you could do with this. like NEEDING to evacuate a stars grav field when "scientists say a solar flair will erupt soon" and the visuals of seeing the flair being flung out in some random direction hoping it doenst hit your planet... or watching it hit your enemies and going to attack right after.   

Also i know planets wont orbit and i dont mind that so much, but what about comets? why not have commits orbiting, with a small grav well that auto connects a trade path to the neirest grav well, but not colonizable... just for being sneeky you could watch were the orbit will head next and hide a fleet on it and dive down from above once the trade lane moves to the next grav well wich your enemy owns   ... what do you guys think of this??
Reply #14 from Sins Forums Top
why not? chicks are nice


chicks why not


anything that encourages girls to play a game I like, is fine with me! Purple Stars FTW!


and they say reverse psychology is BS...
Reply #15 from Sins Forums Top
purple stars would make chicks want to play it, and thats the LAST thing we need


Remember everybody, eet has already hooked up with Yarlen so any girls which might steal "Yarley" away from eet would be bad for him.  
Reply #16 from Sins Forums Top
and the visuals of seeing the flair being flung out in some random direction hoping it doenst hit your planet...


When was the last time the earth was threatened by a solar flare? Never, right? (Something to do with geomagnetism, go look it up yourself... )
Reply #17 from Sins Forums Top

- solar flares? not just fancy effects from star, but what about random huge flares (one an hour?) which errupt from the star and slowly move out across the system (slowly) im sure there are lots of things you can guys can come up with so it can effect gameplay... (lose phase lanes?) sheilds reduced in the storm? planets effected when it hits them. This is a bit like that plasma storm effect you got in B3, but its just feels a bit randomly placed.


why has no one yet commented on this idea??? THIS IS A GREAT IDEA! I LOVE IT! there is so much you could do with this. like NEEDING to evacuate a stars grav field when "scientists say a solar flair will erupt soon" and the visuals of seeing the flair being flung out in some random direction hoping it doenst hit your planet... or watching it hit your enemies and going to attack right after.

Also i know planets wont orbit and i dont mind that so much, but what about comets? why not have commits orbiting, with a small grav well that auto connects a trade path to the neirest grav well, but not colonizable... just for being sneeky you could watch were the orbit will head next and hide a fleet on it and dive down from above once the trade lane moves to the next grav well wich your enemy owns ... what do you guys think of this??



It's good ideas, but I don't know what the devs would think about it. TBH I haven't seen the devs to be very "astronomy 101 savvy." It would add some dynamics to the game if solar flares were added. They would randomly occur in a direction, and any planet hit by it would get its electronics turned off for a period of time, leaving all orbital structures, fighters/bombers out of order for the time being.

For countering you could research a civic tech like SFO(solar flare observation). Granting you access to a tactical structure that would in reality observe the sun and prepare for solar flares alerting the planet and structures to shut off until it passes. In game it would just leave you invulnerable to solar flares.

Maybe its too "complicated." People might have a hard time understanding that the sun is more than just a light bulb and has reactive consequences. Same with comets, I don't think orbits will ever make it into the game and without them, comets aren't as fun.
Reply #18 from Sins Forums Top
glad its getting back on topic now..

Solar storms can effect the ships(missiles don't lock?), phase lanes become unstable? maybe a super weapon you can fire at the star to make it unstable?

However even if the devs dont go with solar storms. I want to see the star itself become 5x bigger, its pretty much the same size of planets! Of course people will say it can be that small. But it doesn't make it feel like a star system, the proportions seem out.

Also my other suggestion of some system wide effect like an asteroid belt (visual effect) cutting its way though the system (pics in my first post) I 100% believe will give it that "solar system" shape. You can have it around the edge of the system. Hey it doe not even have to be 'asteriods' if the devs think it migh cause visual problems with planets, phase lanes.. how about just those dust disks you use on some of the planets? that way im sure it would not require rendered asteriods and also gets past the problem if it looking 'weird' if ships/planets etc are flying/moving into it?
Reply #19 from Sins Forums Top
I want to see the star itself become 5x bigger, its pretty much the same size of planets! Of course people will say it can be that small. But it doesn't make it feel like a star system, the proportions seem out.

Agree. In reality most of the planets are much, much smaller than their sun...

Reply #20 from Sins Forums Top

eet and I haven't hooked up.

Nifty little additions like comets, solar flares, etc. are planned but you may not see them during beta.

Reply #21 from Sins Forums Top
thats great, so what about scaling up the star then, and when you at it, can you change the bulb inside, green, pink, purple stars dont look cool!   
Reply #22 from Sins Forums Top
They look great, its alot better then seeing 3 different coloured stars. As to the scale of stars, dont they depict the largeness of the star's gravity well by having ships slowed down alot when in their gravity well? just because the circles look the same doesnt mean they are the same, after all i dont think id want a giant circle 2-3 X the current gravity well. It would make things look to weird...
Reply #23 from Sins Forums Top
well it is a star hell if you slingshot around them you can travel back in time!

I would welcome a bigger gravity well, As its whats holding the planets in orbit. There are a lot of additiona tactics I feel could be implemented in the game such as smaller ships cannot travel to the stars gravity well... only the bigger capital ships can withstand it etc etc
Reply #24 from Sins Forums Top
the solar flares are a nice idea, maybe the affect asteroid worlds more than terran ones because of said geomagnetism.

the comet thing is a very good idea. if it hides whoever is hiding there and lets you phase jump to a planet its flying by closely (or is going to) then the enemy has to consider an attack but has no idea if it is coming and what may be waiting for him. for this to work everyone should know the approximate path of the comet. and further maybe, there could be a price for riding the comet like damage to shields or loss of antimater. the more extreme the higher the penalty, just to balance out the element of surprise.
Reply #25 from Sins Forums Top

and the visuals of seeing the flair being flung out in some random direction hoping it doenst hit your planet...


When was the last time the earth was threatened by a solar flare? Never, right? (Something to do with geomagnetism, go look it up yourself... )


While its true that solar flares dont pose that much of a threat to us here on the ground they deffinitly DO pose a threat to any sattalite that is not in low earth orbit. And even then every once in a while when a big one heads directly for earth we do get cell phone disruption and internet instability (like in both 2000, and 2003) and even power outages (North East US and Canada, 1989) CNN Link. Because we know their comming, we can shut off satalites and transfer to ground based back ups. However, the big ones still seem to mess with us... just for the record

But really, i understand in the furture they would have sheilded systems and what not, so the devistation wouldnt be as bad as we would see if we were noobs in space. But its still hard for me to see a way to be outside a HUGE magnetic field and not have to shut down power while it passes. The shear magnitude of the electro-magnetic fields involved are just mind blowing... a solar flare is truely an awe inspireing sight.

No really! awe inspireing. Its "welcome week" here at UCIrvine and we had the telescope out today looking at the sun (through a filter ) and there is a huge solar flare blowing off the side of the sun right as i type... its truely a sight to behold on a size scale our minds realistically cannot fathom... yes i know the numbers, but i cant even wrap my head around how small i am compared to what i just saw!

And that in a nutshell is why i love studying what im studying

I LOVE SPACE!!!