Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

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Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by BEZ_BASHNI »

Hi 2 all here.

Currently i am trying to build a test mod based on a vegastrike ,wich will provide more-or-less physically correct space model.
The first thing I want to do - remove the 'space viscosity' - the fake force , which makes the ship to stop in vacuum space.
I examined the sources but looks like the physics.cpp functions like ResistiveLiquidTorque is never used in the current build.
Please advise where to start .

My project highlights:
1. Correct Newton physics.
2. In-game ship constructor - the player buys frame , main engine, correction engines ,reactor, shield , antigrav (max acceleration the ship can reach),lasers ,missiles, combines 'em ant try to fly it.
3. The ships cannot be scanned/seen within solar system behind planets .
4. 'Astronomically correct sky' -the player can look at the sky view at any solar system, choose the star and fly to it (in case the universe is randomly generated , the sky textures will be rendered according the universe model and solarsystem viewpoint.
5.Huge stations and no planet landing (at the current stage).

For me now the most important is to implant a correct physical model -after i'll launch server and try a netplay to adjust balance and see how the dogfight will look like with a realistic physics model...
Last edited by pheonixstorm on Wed Nov 16, 2011 11:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Be gone all caps!
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Re: MODIFY PHYSICS -GET RID OF VISCOSITY-UNDERWATER MODEL

Post by klauss »

First, to get your mod working, you'll have to use proper caps on the title :p

You know... all caps is rude.

Second, all you have to do is set the governor limits on all units close to 'c' (speed of light), and that's it.

It will make the interface a little... uncomfortable, but well, that's what you want.

Third, you'll have to realize that there is no fake force in the game, only a nav-computer assist (the governor) that limits your relative velocity, to avoid your ship from getting out of control. Which you can override by going into navigation mode, rather than combat mode, and, I'm sure, is mentioned in the manual.
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Re: MODIFY PHYSICS -GET RID OF VISCOSITY-UNDERWATER MODEL

Post by TBeholder »

Heh, heh, heh. I at least asked before reading all TFM (and there weren't that much of it at the time). :P
But yeah, there's no liquid vacuum in VS - it all was distilled into Rlaan liquors, or something like this. No stealth-infuntry either. :wink:
You can even fire thrusters manually and probably would need to bind this in a more convenient way to fully use maneuverable ships. Or turn off the compensator altogether (InertialToggle - default "~", mouse #6 or joystick #6) and then fire thrusters manually at will. Sometimes it'sa good idea for fighting - depends on the tactics, of course.

Sadly, no gravity and air resistance (like in First Encounters) implemented so far, though. Maybe, that's what liquid functions are supposed to do. I don't know what devs think, but if and when VS fully adapts under OGRE (which got ready physics plugins) it would be a wasted effort.
Smoothly integrated star systems? It's a Generally Good Idea in the long run, and mods need alternatives to jump-points, but for VS as we know it now or anything close to it... suppose the next star is 25 LY away, and your ship's max velocity in SPEC is 99.999 c. How long would it take? Right.
Non-transparent planets and ships and so on - of course it would be good, and there will be a big sensor overhaul sooner or later. The moment radars will really provide client a model and not just a filtered window into the universe data, a lot of improvements will become trivial.

Better customization of ship modules, especially extensive - there are good possibilities on ship/parts data level already. We're discussing best ways to deal with thrusters in VS now. Armor plating is worse and requires non-trivial code changes, but there are several fairly obvious solutions too. The main problem is that compatibility is a good thing, so the developers have to choose which way VS will go.

All in all, before modding try to use the full power of VS, look into controls, config variables, then viable mod(s), then (so you know what to search) look at the code - there's really surprising amount of already implemented fun stuff (such as alternative lock reticle), mostly-implemented would-be cool things, and really weird crap with enigmatic purpose. :lol:
Last edited by TBeholder on Thu Nov 17, 2011 12:42 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by travists »

Yes, air resistance and gravity would be nice... sling shot around a gas giant: cut it too close and the drag pulls you in crushing your ship, don't cut close enough and you won't get the maximum boost :twisted:

Sounds like BEZ_BASHNI is looking in the same direction that VS is heading, with the exception that VS plays with physics to boost playability for those not looking for a true-to-life space sim.
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by TBeholder »

travists wrote:Yes, air resistance and gravity would be nice... sling shot around a gas giant: cut it too close and the drag pulls you in crushing your ship, don't cut close enough and you won't get the maximum boost :twisted:
I'm for gravity + warp = tidal force, but yeah, sort of. Though given their size it would be a looooong loop.
travists wrote:Sounds like BEZ_BASHNI is looking in the same direction that VS is heading, with the exception that VS plays with physics to boost playability for those not looking for a true-to-life space sim.
I am fully intended to create a "hard" mod - with battles between big ships at ~100km - 1Mm ranges, and so on. And maybe participate in another (because if 1C will drool a little more, this baby eventually will get a fan-mod on some other engine... smoke pillars in space, indeed). It's just that most of desired features has their requirements.
And yeah, FFE was a good lesson on what happens when even great coders try to build a great castle in the air. :(
I mostly prefer to wait for some doors to open (in our case, OGRE transition seems to be a bottleneck before an ocean) because i don't see how to help with such things, but could build upon them once they exist.
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by klauss »

travists wrote:Yes, air resistance and gravity would be nice... sling shot around a gas giant: cut it too close and the drag pulls you in crushing your ship, don't cut close enough and you won't get the maximum boost :twisted:

Sounds like BEZ_BASHNI is looking in the same direction that VS is heading, with the exception that VS plays with physics to boost playability for those not looking for a true-to-life space sim.
Problem is, gravitational maneuvers are so complex that they require supercomputers to be planned. I don't think we could add gravity in any gameplay-enhancing way. People won't want to do all those complex maneuvers, if they knew how, and we can't code an autopilot that does it for you (at least not reallistically, the player's computer is not a supercomputer).

Furthermore, most ships already have supra-G accelerations in all directions, meaning gravitational maneuvers wouldn't help much in comparison of simply firing thrusters. In order to make gravity interesting, ship accelerations would have to be decreased.

We already talked all this a lot, especially when chuck was still active, you must remember how much he loved realism, and he himself would agree that gravity would not work, gameplay-wise, in the current UTCS universe.

Now, certain aspects of gravity, like orbits, and gravity well death traps, would be desirable. It's only a matter of figuring out how to bring those features without all the negative side of gravity.

Atmospheric friction would also be really interesting, which brings us to the old idea of effectors: volumes of space that have the ability to apply some effect on passing ships. Atmospheres, dust fields, star coronas, and lots of other space landscape features would be efficiently represented by effectors.
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by travists »

There are games that mastering gravity is the method of space flight; and it should I’d like to mention that the computers used to plot the orbital dynamics of the Apollo era space missions (likely into the '80s which would include Voyager) could be surpassed by today's smart phones. But, I find no fault in your reasoning, Klauss, Such would unnecessarily complicate the game and add processor drag. Effectors brings up a wish list of effects, but I'll keep them to myself for now.
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by klauss »

Apollo only had to go to the moon. Interplanetary flight, however, is a different matter.

Those missions spend months planning. Maybe the bottleneck is not computing power, but that it requires a hefty amount of it I'm sure.
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by travists »

For another disscustion in another place I looked this up:
http://www.bautforum.com/archive/index.php/t-9855.html wrote:jfribrg 23-February-2004, 09:50 PM
The quick answer is : g=-GM/(r*r),
where :

g is the acceleration of gravity at a particular point. On the surface of the Earth, g is approximately 9.81 m/s^2

G is the universal gravitational constant = 6.67x10^-11 Nm^2/kg^2

M is the mass of the object. For earth M = 5.98x10^24kg

r is the distance from the center of the gravitating body. For the surface of the Earth, r is approximately 6.38x10^6 m.

So the calculation for earth is : -6.67E-11 * 5.98E24/((6.38E6)^2). The negative sign is used to reflect the fact that the pull of gravity is toward the center, which usually a negative point on an Earth-based coordinate system.

To calculate the gravitational pull on another planet or star, just look up the mass and radius, do the calculation and compare to 9.81

This works for any point outside the planet, and is based on the assumption that the gravitational pull of other objects is negligible. If you want to calculate the gravitational pull on a point inside the planet, the calculation gets messy because you have to take into consideration how the mass is distributed inside.
If every planet where given a reasonable mass and we only calculate the nearest dozen or so objects mass gravity could be added without much processor drag (use the gravity at distance to apply "thrust" tword the object). The question is: is there any point?
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by TBeholder »

klauss wrote:Problem is, gravitational maneuvers are so complex that they require supercomputers to be planned. I don't think we could add gravity in any gameplay-enhancing way.
[...]
Now, certain aspects of gravity, like orbits, and gravity well death traps, would be desirable. It's only a matter of figuring out how to bring those features without all the negative side of gravity.
Well, those maneuvers are planned for vehicles with very limited power and even more limited total stored energy. Now, we talk about "RAM torch capable of blasting out 10+ g for hours, powered by a fusion reactor that can also keep this for hours, and cooling it in process". Boosters? What boosters? In which case, considerations like packing enough of chemical energy in fuel and then turning it into potential+kinetical energy of an orbiting ship don't impose their normal limitations, at all. So proper fine optimization may go very, very far.
Meaning, you set the thrust equal to G force, you stand in the air. Apply a bit more/less, and you accelerate until the air resistance balances the difference, then move at a constant speed. Rough and tumble.
If the goal is to keep a reasonable constant acceleration along the path (surface - given orbit height), we need to calculate travel time or whatever with a simple integral to appraise it, but during the travel an autopilot would simply set acceleration according to gravity and Coriolis force at the moment, that's all. If you want to consider gravity not just ~ R^-2 of a single mass point, but by the planet's form in its proximity, fine, it's going to be a more complex, but the physics engine will still need only functions for g-force and c-force themselves. The autopilot will measure the same force and compensate, that's all.

Frontier: First Encounters had gravity and air. The result? As long as your autopilot can land you at a spaceport, being able to do the same manually without burning or crashing is definitely neat, but mostly it doesn't unless you want to deploy/collect mining bots - and people managed to do that.

As to gravity maneuvers, even though we don't need free energy acquired so slowly, delta-V matters as long as the ship's propellant is limited and velocity should be somewhat reasonable for a survivable reentry. Now, if SPEC would obey momentum preservation (warp-field may do anything while active, but mv after = mv before), this would be a problem... to which SPEC also gives a solution. Because it's easy to cheat up great amount of delta-v if it doesn't affect your place in a gravity well to begin with. Again, a rough approximation: you fly "behind" a planet as low as it's safe, drop back to "real" velocity so gravity "catches up" and decelerates you properly - then repeat until the orbit is elliptic. To pull this, you'd only need two indicators: vector "true-local-velocity" and height/safe height. Add bases on stationary orbits optimized for arrivals from next planets, and it's a common highway.
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by klauss »

Except for the last part, which I don't fully follow, what you suggest basically turns gravity into a fuel sucker, and that's it.

If the ship compensates for gravity by firing thrusters (it can, they're powerful enough), its only effect is to use up fuel. Coding gravity support just for that is a waste of effort.

I agree gravity is a big missing concept, but I don't agree that its sole effect should be effect it has on fuel consumption, nor that full orbital maneuvering would be desirable.
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by pheonixstorm »

I think one real problem for planetary gravity would be trying to keep a stable orbit. The controls for using multiple thrusters just isn't there. Current spaecraft/stations have to keep firing thrusters to maintain orbital velocity and position while also having to keep (for the ISS anyway) a rotation always facing the sun (which from what I understand also uses gyroscopes and weights to help with this in the most basic of concepts).

If we added planetary gravity into the mix it would require a few extras. First being adding some type of pressure rating for various ships. Think about a small cargo ship not designed for atmospheric flight getting sucked into the gravity well of Jupiter. Get pulled too far in and the pressure from 5, 10, 20gs would put strain on the various ship systems and start to cause damage to them (and perhaps the hull/internal structure as well). Civie ships would in most cases not be equipped to handle this type of strain while some or most milspec ships could, at least for extended periods of time.

Another aspect could be the affects of both gravity and atmosphere during combat. It would be a constant struggle between gravity pulling you down and the atmosphere slowing you down and burning you up. Not a good combo if your trying to dog fight on the fringe of atmo and space, but I would love to try it :)

For now I think this could or maybe should be a low priority feature request, something to discuss for awhile until we know we are ready to tackle everything thats involved. I think @log0 should get into this discussion due to the work hes doing on seamless planetary flight.
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by travists »

Gravity is good, Gravity + atmos = better, (gravity + atmos) x ships with different resistances = GREAT!! Throw in drag and/or em interference from nebulae, heat/radiation effectors from stars... Whole new tactics could develop.
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by Hicks »

I thought you would need to implement gravity anyways with the ogre engine and planetary flight? Same as air resistance/pressure.
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by TBeholder »

klauss wrote:Except for the last part, which I don't fully follow, what you suggest basically turns gravity into a fuel sucker, and that's it. If the ship compensates for gravity by firing thrusters (it can, they're powerful enough), its only effect is to use up fuel.
Without air resistance - mostly, yes, as long as you can avoid collision, which reasonable approach velocity and a decent autopilot could do. With air resistance - it helps to set more interesting limitations, like the Reentry Corridor of Vulnerability, for one.
klauss wrote: Coding gravity support just for that is a waste of effort.
May be anyway, if a ready physics engine will make this trivial later.
klauss wrote: I agree gravity is a big missing concept, but I don't agree that its sole effect should be effect it has on fuel consumption, nor that full orbital maneuvering would be desirable.
Full orbital maneuvering takes so much time that it can't have much visible impact in relatively fast action settings of VS, Elite, etc. Basic orbital mechanics, though, is cool.
Stations not being stationary unless they're on a proper orbit is a neat little element, but the player is going to see only the net result: the thing changing its place on an elliptical orbit. Unless PC owns a station, in which case there are propelant (for correction) and radiator (shadow-light-shadow-light) considerations (predictable), and that's about it.

I don't think that gravity calculations are really necessary each tick as far as most of the big stuff (planets and most comets/big asteroids) is concerned, however. We know the next few millenia it will roll on along the same orbit, parameters of which we already know.
The convenient approach being "why waste CPU cycles on re-calculating a known near-unshakeable equilibrium? Black-box it."
Hicks wrote:I thought you would need to implement gravity anyways with the ogre engine and planetary flight? Same as air resistance/pressure.
No need to stop at constrains before there are any. :wink:
"Ogre is a graphics engine, and only a graphics engine." - so there are various addons binding physics engines to OGRE (as well as 3 different GUI listed, BTW).
The engines not having a very specific purpose, as a matter of convenience, tend to allow the choice of what exactly the physical model does beyond the basic functionality, to save CPU cycles on unnecessary precision / features. The Gangsta Wrapper (already working, but frozen), for example, allows to choose your physics engine without changing the code.
That is, even after choosing the engine (needs good collision detection, doesn't need good joint dynamics and friction) supporting all necessary functions, it's possible to choose specifics of the physics model components in config - i.e. per mod.
If we don't need a complex aerodynamics model, just basic air resistance F(V) or F(V, [tensor]) - so be it. If we also want basic lift function (using ready parameters, not messing with wing models) for aerospace/suborbital vehicles - again, fine. I already mentioned two options for gravity, ODE, for example, leaves it up to user functions. As long as the physics engine covers these variants itself or via its own plugins.
pheonixstorm wrote:I think one real problem for planetary gravity would be trying to keep a stable orbit. The controls for using multiple thrusters just isn't there.
It's unnecessary. The pilot should think, navigation computer work. :wink:
I think about indication of a ship's current orbit, maybe eventual addition of choosing an orbit by setting these. But again, normal maneuvers are unreasonably slow if you got SPEC. It's more like lift-off, buzz away, reentry.
pheonixstorm wrote:Current spaecraft/stations have to keep firing thrusters to maintain orbital velocity and position while also having to keep
In what time? With an orbital station, we can roughly estimate orbital decay from height, calculate how much propellant it needs - let's say, per month (or year) - if they can spend it, they hold their place. Calculation of Pluto's influence on each comsat every tick is something we could live without even if while having basic orbital mechanics.
pheonixstorm wrote: If we added planetary gravity into the mix it would require a few extras. First being adding some type of pressure rating for various ships. Think about a small cargo ship not designed for atmospheric flight getting sucked into the gravity well of Jupiter.
Well, this too. Why not? I thought more about ship construction being limited to so much g, and inertial compensator or whatever keeping it within the limit of lifesupport (i.e. pilot, so different per species). Got it broken? Accelerations are limited to a few g that won't splash you on a wall. IIRC, there was such a component in WC.
pheonixstorm wrote: Another aspect could be the affects of both gravity and atmosphere during combat. It would be a constant struggle between gravity pulling you down and the atmosphere slowing you down and burning you up. Not a good combo if your trying to dog fight on the fringe of atmo and space, but I would love to try it :)
Well, yeah - air combat is a challenge even for vehicles designed for it. So for most part spacecraft is better off leaving it to special aerial/suborbital forces. Which it can deploy, of course.
And that's not counting what atmosphere and magnetic field can do with most weapons intended for use in deep space. :twisted:
Conversely, surface-based defence can use things unusable in vacuum, such as electron guns (fireworks are bonus).
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by travists »

All of which puts us back to the question of is it worth it?
There are several programs out there, some free others not, that can generate planetary systems with mass calculated orbits that might be used to include or as math ideas to have accurate orbital times as a hard part of the data. Gravity is then back to being largely a fuel drain. While it would be interesting to bank off a planet's gravity, does it add enough?
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by greenfreedom10 »

It sure would be fun to try out gravity, like phoenixstorm said about a dog-fight at the edge of the atmosphere! :) Somehow it just does not seem correct to shoot toward a planet at full thrust until near to docking without any concern about atmosphere-generated heat nor reverse-thrust to mitigate the effect of gravity. A damaged ship with reduced thrust capability should have to do an orbital entry to avoid overheating or crash-landing. It would be great to include gravity in the game, but yes its effects would have to be significantly adjusted from reality.
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by BEZ_BASHNI »

1. Thanks for the answers - i used '~' to get rid of the handbrake and the physics appeared to be more-or less normal (except the axis rotation - still no inertia)
I mapped thrusters and was a bit confused with the design of the ship -it must have at least 12 thruster nozzles to do 3-axis strafe and 3-axis rotation.
The acceleration and brake force is equal and the ship accelerates strafing left the same way as forward and reverse.It looks like more logical to make ship with like 6 nozzles to accelerate straingt ,+4 to rotate and 2 to nose up-down . Probably some ships where you need to break turning your nose opposite direction should be there - i tried to fight and dock using only up-down, rotation and afterburner - some fun is there.

The ideas about atmosphere - I dont think it is required at this stage - first something must be done with the terrain/landscape generation - in most cases atmosphere effects appear too close to planet , but even before you reach that distance the planet already looks too ugly.

The gravity must be added but it will not change too much in the gameplay- you will need to cruise hours in front of the planet to see the difference. Currently we can assume , that stations are on high geostationary orbits. The spec-drive speed is to fast and powerfull ,comparing with the gravitational forces, so they will not play significant role in the gameplay untill we will be ready to spend few days traveling from planet to planet.
For some it will be quite useful to try install and fly orbiter and see how it looks like in reality.

Currently I am looking how to improve the fight itself making it more logical an realistic from the physics realities-and keeping it balanced- the lasers should fire infinite range (effective 100 km+) (they fire more distance in space nowdays) , autoaim is definitly the evil , also I have doubt about machinegun-style weapons-the bullet/particle will fly in space forewer the same speeed -so the will have to be infinite range .
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by klauss »

BEZ_BASHNI wrote:1. Thanks for the answers - i used '~' to get rid of the handbrake and the physics appeared to be more-or less normal (except the axis rotation - still no inertia)
I mapped thrusters and was a bit confused with the design of the ship -it must have at least 12 thruster nozzles to do 3-axis strafe and 3-axis rotation.
Yes, the issue is that models don't have that into account.
It's a graphical oddity.

We have the support for adding the nozzles, more or less, but the models themselves don't support a sane way of adding them.
BEZ_BASHNI wrote:The acceleration and brake force is equal and the ship accelerates strafing left the same way as forward and reverse.It looks like more logical to make ship with like 6 nozzles to accelerate straingt ,+4 to rotate and 2 to nose up-down . Probably some ships where you need to break turning your nose opposite direction should be there - i tried to fight and dock using only up-down, rotation and afterburner - some fun is there.
Again, that's a long-standing oddity. I don't think it will get completely fixed, it would completely change the game. Maybe balanced a bit, but never fully consistent. That would be a different mod.
BEZ_BASHNI wrote:The ideas about atmosphere - I dont think it is required at this stage - first something must be done with the terrain/landscape generation - in most cases atmosphere effects appear too close to planet , but even before you reach that distance the planet already looks too ugly.
Consider gas giants, though. They have higher atmospheres.
BEZ_BASHNI wrote: The gravity must be added but it will not change too much in the gameplay- you will need to cruise hours in front of the planet to see the difference. Currently we can assume , that stations are on high geostationary orbits. The spec-drive speed is to fast and powerfull ,comparing with the gravitational forces, so they will not play significant role in the gameplay untill we will be ready to spend few days traveling from planet to planet.
For some it will be quite useful to try install and fly orbiter and see how it looks like in reality.
Any idea how to (gameplay-wise) solve the issues mentioned up till now?

If we come up with a reasonable gameplay feature involving gravity, I'll applaud and probably work on it.
BEZ_BASHNI wrote:the lasers should fire infinite range (effective 100 km+) (they fire more distance in space nowdays) , autoaim is definitly the evil , also I have doubt about machinegun-style weapons-the bullet/particle will fly in space forewer the same speeed -so the will have to be infinite range .
Lasers would spread at large distances, and energy concentration would drop below weaponized levels. Not sure if 100km is ok for it, but that's the idea of laser range.

Particles would disintegrate. Charged plasma bolts would become neutralized, bullets... I don't know, but probably something. In any case, the limitation is technical. We can't track all bullets forever.
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by travists »

BEZ_BASHNI mentioned something that I'd like to see more of. While I seem to remember the Ox slopping around a bit. More inertia in turning would be nice. Is this an engine or data-set issue?
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by klauss »

travists wrote:BEZ_BASHNI mentioned something that I'd like to see more of. While I seem to remember the Ox slopping around a bit. More inertia in turning would be nice. Is this an engine or data-set issue?
Dataset.

All ships have max angular acceleration and speed.

The max angular acceleration would be physical, the speed would relate to governor settings.
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travists
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by travists »

Gotcha, up the max rotational speed and leave the thruster speed alone and they will spin for a long time if it takes a long time to get up to speed. Might have to play :| .....
Hicks
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by Hicks »

The mass moments of inertia in the units.csv are the same vaules as the mass of the ship. Realistically, these should be a lot larger then what they are now, as i suspect some of the ships are a lot longer then a few meters
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by TBeholder »

BEZ_BASHNI wrote:1. Thanks for the answers - i used '~' to get rid of the handbrake and the physics appeared to be more-or less normal (except the axis rotation - still no inertia)
I can only guess that for developers it was as hard to imagine a reason to turn off rotation stabilizer as it is to me.
BEZ_BASHNI wrote: I mapped thrusters and was a bit confused with the design of the ship -it must have at least 12 thruster nozzles to do 3-axis strafe and 3-axis rotation. [...] to make ship with like 6 nozzles to accelerate straingt ,+4 to rotate and 2 to nose up-down
Sure, why not? It's possible to make Elite style controls or whatever simply by assigning (in units.csv) zero to some of 6 DOFs.
BEZ_BASHNI wrote: The acceleration and brake force is equal and the ship accelerates strafing left the same way as forward and reverse.
Should not be... usually a.forward > a.backward > a.lateral.x=a.lateral.y (except Rlaan ships - but they're supposed to use gravitics instead of thrusters). Which ship has equal thrusts?
BEZ_BASHNI wrote: For some it will be quite useful to try install and fly orbiter and see how it looks like in reality.
While "having a feel" in itself is good... It's rather "how it looks like without a decent autopilot". :wink:
Controlling parameters of all mechanisms directly and manually would render many mundane devices from a fridge and up much harder to use too. But a fridge controlled by manual switch instead of a heat regulator is not "more real" - the opposite, and specifically because it would be so inconvenient. :mrgreen:
I don't see why things that need at most a good MCU to control in most standard situations should require any non-trivial activity from user in settings lacking Butlerian Jihad or something like this. BTW, especially widespread and annoying is lack of point defence capable of hitting a barn at point-blank on its own.
BEZ_BASHNI wrote: the lasers should fire infinite range (effective 100 km+) (they fire more distance in space nowdays)
Heavily depends on aperture, required energy on target, etc. Try to find this on paper or at least scanned better, it got physics for most variants. But yeah, energy amounts in VS are set almost arbitrary. Probably wouldn't be if heat was counted.
As to simulation, the farther you track anything, the more CPU it eats. It could be "realistic" to track ~100km rays if we could also at least set precision/drift of a shot, but as is this would be more of a ridiculous overkill. It's trivial to improve, but the whole thing is going to be overhauled into uniform system ("effectors") anyway, so why bother now.
BEZ_BASHNI wrote:the bullet/particle will fly in space forewer the same speeed -so the will have to be infinite range .
And you really want to track each bullet indefinitely? I'd multiply ranges maybe by 10 or so, but farther? The space's big and all that. If it didn't hit anything by this time, it may as well be considered lost forever in the emptiness, along with all other improbable-to-meet sand and gravel.
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BEZ_BASHNI
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Re: Modify physics -get rid of viscosi -underwater model

Post by BEZ_BASHNI »


I can only guess that for developers it was as hard to imagine a reason to turn off rotation stabilizer as it is to me.
It is not a stabilizer problem - it rotates with a constant speed and stop immediately. to start rotation you need to fire a thruster as well as to stop. Any physics based autopilot first need data to do a movement - like rotate 10 degrees clockwise- it will calculate how long to fire thruster to start rotation and then fire opposite one exactly the same time to stop it. But U cannot make stabilizer to stop rotation immediately after you lift up a / key.

Should not be... usually a.forward > a.backward > a.lateral.x=a.lateral.y (except Rlaan ships - but they're supposed to use gravitics instead of thrusters). Which ship has equal thrusts?
You're right - I tried the wrong ship.
But a fridge controlled by manual switch instead of a heat regulator is not "more real" - the opposite, and specifically because it would be so inconvenient.
In orbiter there's a button 'kill rotation' -it exists in all nowdays piloted spacecrafts . Because only like this is possible to save fuel - if the ship autostabilises after your each small move it will eat 10 times more fuel- and will turn slower, than possible in fully manual or fully auto mode.

Weapons -yes -need just to increase the range , but it will be fun to find during next visit to the system all your fired dumbfires orbiting the local moon. :)

P.S. Some questions to play with the code :
Where's hiding the code drawing the hud radar - I want to add some filtering.
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