u/Jo_Krone

I've heard plenty and all sorts of complaints about ground vehicles in SC. I have my own. And I'm not referring to physics but purpose. The current planets don't offer much reasons to need to use ground vehicles when you can fly anywhere you want.

So why doesn't CIG introduce planets that are rich in resources (offering a motive) but the atmospheric surface pressure is too high to fly, or consumes too much fuel for lift. And I'm just talking about atmospheric surface pressure, not composition. In our own solar system we have planets that are impossible to land without crashing due to the atmospheric pressure. For example, Earth is 1.01 bars but Venus is 92 crushing bars. Perhaps not that strong but enough to allow ground vehicles to move around.

The image is from an old game called Deserts of Kharak from the Homeworld series. In the game their technology was limited so they used ground vehicles, but just modifying the concept for SC, imagine large carrier size ships with salvage, resource collecting, mining, scouting ground vehicles inside. This would introduce all sorts of industrial and defense vehicles and more purpose for ground vehicles in SC.

To get to the planet surface you would need some sort of specialized industrial transport that connects to a station above the atmosphere. This transportation service could be provided by companies such as Genesis Terraforming, Tadmor Terraforming Concern (TTC), NemoCo or ARGO that can ascend/descend cargo and ground vehicles.

The Transport vehicles have to be large enough to transport large carrier size ships, maybe like the size of a XL hangar platform. Perhaps there could be multiple size Transports providing services at different aUEC prices. So if I only have a small research/scouting ground vehicle I don't get an XL size transport. Maybe a small one and pay a small transport service fee.

I was thinking that after you load your vehicle(s) onto the transport you would indicate in a terminal on said Transport what sector of the planet you'd want to be dropped at. Once it reaches the sector and lands it releases your vehicles and returns back to the station. You can call a Transport for pickup whenever you decide to return.

As for players they can't walk freely outside but would need ATLS style walkers that would have a sealed cabin encapsulating the player and regulating the atmospheric pressure like submersibles do.

So this is me throwing ideas. Your turn.

I couldn’t find a stand where the monitor floated over the C128 so decided to make my own. I can push it deeper under the monitor. I don’t know why this design is not easy to find.

I have retained some computers throughout the years and others have aquired little by little. Was hesitant to turn them on but all went well and they booted alright.

Spacecrafts should continue moving even when their engines are turned off because of Newton's First Law, which states that an object in motion will stay in motion at the same velocity unless acted upon by an external force. In the vacuum of space, there is no friction or air resistance to slow them down.

When a ship's engine is turned off and it's in movement it begins to slow down. Let's say this is a "technical feature". But I understand it should be so in 'coupled' mode. Why does it slow down in 'decoupled' mode? Because of said "technical feature"?

Why would I want it to continue? I experienced this while testing. I was 1Mm away from a station and had very little fuel. Didn't want to call refueling. I set the ship into 'decoupled' mode thinking I won't spend fuel... but it continued to waste fuel. I turned off the engine and it slowed down the ship until it stopped.

It continues to spend fuel even when decoupled as if it needed fuel to move. It shouldn't.

I understand due to game mechanics, game engine and server resource limitations, everything cannot simply continue to move indefinitely like in real physics... like blasting a rock and it later hits a station or ship or knocks off a player somewhere across Stanton. But at least ships with a player logged in the game AND in his ship should allow indefinite movement and no fuel consumption if engine is turned off. Or extremely very little if the engine is on.

"Like some great beast of burden crossing a hostile plain, the mighty Ironclad lumbered onward, her belly swollen with nearly two million credits’ worth of precious cargo. And then, without warning, the creature seemed to tear itself apart — the cargo section vanished into the void, leaving only a distant quantum marker adrift some 2.5 gigameters away. Yet, as I pursued it through the cold blackness of space, the marker continued to retreat, forever just beyond reach, like a mirage upon a desert horizon. After hours of futile pursuit, I abandoned the chase. The Ironclad, it seems, remains a wounded animal — and until it is truly healed, I shall not trust it again." - Sir David Attenborough

(Happy 100 o7)

Reminds me the mountain range of Quiraing, Isle of Skye, Scotland.... just a wee.

Would love to have these fire spitting drums in our hangars, and even better if in the future the Jukebox is re-introduced it’ll react to whatever music we have playing.