Vega Strike Forums

I heft made a map op the Vega Strike universe with php
http://img547.imageshack.us/img547/7027/vegamap.png (1.9MB)

Wow. The expression "lost without a map" would be unheard ...
I thought the universe is randomly produced when you boot the game; has that changed?, or are there
plans to change it?
It's been suggested at the Features forum, and I think it would be a good idea; but we should first want
to fix the generator to make better planets and bases, better systems and better universes.

Didn't know it was that damned big.

I think someone said the VS universe contains 4,000 solar systems.

I don't remember the universe layout ever being randomly generated. Enyo and Elohim are always next to Cephid 17, for example.

I thought only non-scripted stations and maybe planets are generated dynamically.

OMG!

just how are you supposed to know where you are at in that mess, or how lost you truly are.
It's enough to make my sextant turn cross-eyed.

Deus Siddis wrote:I think someone said the VS universe contains 4,000 solar systems.

I don't remember the universe layout ever being randomly generated. Enyo and Elohim are always next to Cephid 17, for example.

I thought only non-scripted stations and maybe planets are generated dynamically.

My understanding is that there are a handful of scripted systems, including the areas around where you start the game,
and around Sol; but that all the rest, maybe 99.9% give or take, are randomly generated when you hit New Game, or
Campaign, or whatever it's called. In PU, all systems are scripted, of course.
No, wait; many systems in PU (outside of Gemini; not currently reachable; but there anyhow) are auto-generated, but the
connections are scripted, now that I remember.
But, anyhow, I think the engine can auto-generate the system internals only, or internals plus map.
But I could be wrong...

EDIT:
No, you're probably right. I actually never heard about vs auto-generating the map; I think I dreamt it.

i think this is the biggest problem with any space game that deals with vast sections of space.. either you only define a handful of stars out of millions.. (which gets boring and feels unrealistic) or you define tons, and get lost.

VS Need a good map and navigation system really.
maybe with the core systems and trade lanes sharply marked, while distant or unremarked systems, left absent until visited (though paths leading to them showing up in systems you know the layout of) also probably filtering of some sort.

Exactly, as to the problem.
As for the solution, I think it needs to be multifaceted.

• Partly what you're saying: main lines (trade lanes), and secondary lines, and then a third category: un-documented lines and jumps.
• Secondly, there needs to be a role for maps. They should be expensive enough to make you think twice about buying them. They should also be sometimes incorrect, sometimes politicized; and finally there should be a role for unofficial maps, which might sometimes be rip-offs, but sometimes have info you can only get from unofficial sources.
• Third, there needs to be more variability in terms of the numbers of inhabited planets in systems (Earth-like planets seem to be a rarity, in the real universe), as well as in terms of space stations and whatnot. Most systems should be pretty desolate, inhospitable, and risky to run out of fuel in them. Systems with an agricultural planet, mining bases, manufacturing and trade stations, should be few and far between. Right now the vs universe is too homogeneous. Somewhat related to this is that we need a new universe generator for other reasons as well, such as making sure that planet types and orbits make sense. Right now the damned generator put rings at odd angles and around small, rocky planets. That makes NO sense. I think that, once we make the planets make more sense, there will be more constraints on habitability and the economic sense of stations.
• Fourth: Pre-game-time political simulation: If two neighboring factions have been at war for a while, most of their bases around border areas would be damaged or destroyed.
• Fifth: The universe should be at least twice as large as the extent of systems that are actually inhabited by any of the races; and there should be no commercial maps of the areas beyond, and there should be a role for exploring, and ships and upgrades you can buy that are better suited for exploration, such as carrying loads of fuel and spare parts and telemetry and jump-point detection equipment, and maybe even a minimal space elevator kit that you can deploy to back up a claim.

aye, you have good points.

this kinda falls back in to the other discussion, the random fun stuff in space. I generally picture it something like a tree;

You have the main trunk, maybe two or three of these, one for every two factions, at one end you have branches, at the other end you have roots.. which essentially are the same thing.

The main trunk, everyone knows the routs, the names of every planet on them, the name of every system and the inhabitants. Then you get to the branches, each grouping of branches would be part of a separate set of exploration. One faction or another, expanding outwards, exploring, colonizing, setting up way stations.

Then you have the twigs and other odd bits of space junk. Systems with no value, little value, or unexplored.. connected here or there to any number of places. But no one has maps to them, or if they do, its pirate controlled maps, hidden illicit stations and the like.

the main trunks would all be quite survivable, but branches from the main trade lanes could have jumps that go through highly ionized nebulas, or jump past stars with extreme radiation.. or debris fields a dozen AU across due to a strange gravitational anomaly in a star system, causing all of the planets, even as far out as saturn equivlant, to fracture from graviational shear..

just fun interesting stuff to make choke points in the galactic landscape.

As the map is now, its just sprawled all over like a tangled spiderweb. Give it contour that makes sense, that the eye can follow until you reach the marking that says 'beyond here there be dragons.' :p

chuck_starchaser wrote:Exactly, as to the problem.
As for the solution, I think it needs to be multifaceted.

• Partly what you're saying: main lines (trade lanes), and secondary lines, and then a third category: un-documented lines and jumps.
• Secondly, there needs to be a role for maps. They should be expensive enough to make you think twice about buying them. They should also be sometimes incorrect, sometimes politicized; and finally there should be a role for unofficial maps, which might sometimes be rip-offs, but sometimes have info you can only get from unofficial sources.
• Third, there needs to be more variability in terms of the numbers of inhabited planets in systems (Earth-like planets seem to be a rarity, in the real universe), as well as in terms of space stations and whatnot. Most systems should be pretty desolate, inhospitable, and risky to run out of fuel in them. Systems with an agricultural planet, mining bases, manufacturing and trade stations, should be few and far between. Right now the vs universe is too homogeneous. Somewhat related to this is that we need a new universe generator for other reasons as well, such as making sure that planet types and orbits make sense. Right now the damned generator put rings at odd angles and around small, rocky planets. That makes NO sense. I think that, once we make the planets make more sense, there will be more constraints on habitability and the economic sense of stations.
• Fourth: Pre-game-time political simulation: If two neighboring factions have been at war for a while, most of their bases around border areas would be damaged or destroyed.
• Fifth: The universe should be at least twice as large as the extent of systems that are actually inhabited by any of the races; and there should be no commercial maps of the areas beyond, and there should be a role for exploring, and ships and upgrades you can buy that are better suited for exploration, such as carrying loads of fuel and spare parts and telemetry and jump-point detection equipment, and maybe even a minimal space elevator kit that you can deploy to back up a claim.

There should be no random as far as were the planets are. but instead have a "system" that dictates were planets are, and were they are supposed to be. IE: They way our own planets and solar system orbit around other planets and systems.

You could use what chuck_starchaser said and implement that as a set of rules that game uses to build the universe.

Some systems might stay the same, were as other systems will orbit and change location - at one time in the game the systems are close and easy to jump to at other times they are far apart and can't be reached. (that would work great for causing maps to be fake maps)

Ok, maybe you can have a rough planet that breaks free of its orbit and and carrines across the universe.