Orbital Distances of Warp Points

[Sha'thar of the Gosht Kohr]

I'd be very interested to hear any thoughts and observations about why the number of AUs a warp point is from the primary matters?

 

Does it affect how stellar terrain influences inbound ships? Might it affect the order of battle in a planetary attack?

 

Any thoughts?

 

-Sha'thar

[MadMartinB]

I believe that there is a web of warp points connecting the number of the warp point and the AU distance. I have seen some correlation of higher number warp points being further out...

 

Not sure though. Maybe the Dyson sphere will fix all!

[WKE235]

Well, I have seen that with stars that have hazards around them, all the warnings occur at the warp points close to the star.

 

Later techs may make use of the distance as well. That's an interesting point about Dyson Sphere's. Any Dyson Sphere (and we know that is a high, high, high level tech in the game) would enclose all the WP's that are in real close. 1 AU = 149.5 Million Kilometers (approximate distance from Earth to Sun). From all the sci-fi, a Dyson Sphere would enclose anything in at least .5 AU distance?

 

So, if you warp into a system inside a Dyson Sphere, can you actually go anywhere?

[Laserwolf]

A 0.5 AU Dyson sphere would roast all but lava beings...

[WKE235]

Roast? Not sure about that. .5 AU around our sun would be rather warm and toasty. But 0.5 AU around many of these dim cool red stars that seem to inhabit my area of the universe might be to big. Lots of red dwarfs, several with planets (which for cold world races might be very homey).

[Laserwolf]

Beg yer pardon there rat man, but you would be capturing the same amount energy at 0.5 AU as you did at 1.0 AU, but be spreading it out over significantly less surface area. one eighth to be exact (halve the radius of your surface area of a sphere equation). Therefore 8x ambient temperature is a bit more than "warm and toasty".

[WKE235]

That's a mutant Cat from Pokemon (or so I'm told by my Niece who created this avatar for me). Anyway, going from 1 AU to .5 AU would increase the energy received per square inch by 8x. But, if the energy output of the star was say 1/100 of Sol (G type Main Sequence) like could be from a red dwarf, that's a lot less energy still at .5 AU.

 

Of course as I think about it, planets radiate heat into space from their dark sides (not evey taking into account reflectivity, dust, and other items that interfere with daytime absorbtion of sunlight). In a Dyson Sphere, since the goal is trapping 100% of all energy, there is no mass radiating of energy into the blackness of space. Some will occur due to thermal transfers from the warm inner surface to the cold outer surface. But the lack of radiating does mean the Dyson's would have to be a lot larger.

[Pandaemonium]

(1) While it probably doesn't affect the question, the surface area of a sphere of halved radius would be one-quarter, the volume would be one-eighth.

 

(2) Thermal radiation from the interior surface would eventually be returned to the Sphere and the heat would be conveyed by conduction or, probably, by active convection to the external surface, where it would radiate out at an equal rate to its reception, if a temperature-stabilized system were achieved. Of course, it would require considerable active effort to duplicate the inate effect of planetary rotation, not to mention our beloved heat sinks (you've got to love that high heat index of water).

 

(3) In addition to incoming and outgoing thermal radiation, the ambient temperature of a planet is affected by the internally generated heat of the planet itself, a large factor on the earth, and, possibly, on other home worlds.

 

Corrections?

 

- Mike

[Damiano]

If I remember rightly a Dyson Sphere isn't actually a solid sphere around the planet but a large number of individual plates around the Star at the correct distance to make them ideal to your race. I would have to assume that each race when they developed this tech would be allowed to convert some or all planets into an ideal living environment for their population. Of course it begs the question will you leave the GEO Yields available on the Plates, or pull all the resources at when you crack the planet open?

[Sha'thar of the Gosht Kohr]

That's a mutant Cat from Pokemon (or so I'm told by my Niece who created this avatar for me).

Actually, your avatar is of Mew Two, an incredibly powerful, dangerous and once (and possibly still) evil Pokemon created by scientists. At one point, Mew Two's goal was to destroy the earth and rebuild it in his own image.

 

Even now, his goals and plans are his own.

 

( Keeping an eye on WKE235 )

 

Anyway, a friend in the game brought up the point that distances of Warp Points may also be important in how soon one gets word of incoming ships, if scanning from a homeworld. That is to say, someone with only medium range sensors might not be able to see someone arriving at a very distant WP.

 

Thoughts?

 

-Sha'thar

[DWillard]

I haven't noticed any correlation between WP # and AU distance. I think the #s are completely random. But I have noticed that the higher the class WP, the closer to the star it is. Class E WPs and higher are typically 0.1 to maybe 100 AU or so. Class A WPs are typically 1000 - 2000+ AUs or so. Bs, Cs, and Ds fall inbetween. There can be overlap but not usually within a particular system. In one system you may have a C at 1400 and in another system a C might be at 400. But within a particular system (not always but a vast majority of the time) it looks like they stay pretty much in order - All As would be the farthest out, then would come the Bs, then Cs, then Ds, Es, etc.

 

What all this means I don't know. Pete has said that the map is actually in 3D though we do not know the coordinates. Maybe this info will eventually help us put together a 3D map.

 

The AUs definitely affect how point terrain is encountered. If a particular system has Solar Flares that extend from the star out to 1.5 AU, if you travel to any orbits or WPs within that range you stand the chance of being hit by the flares (if and when this part of the programming is turned on). If all of the orbits and WPs are outside of the range then there is no way to travel inside that range and you will always be safe in that system.

[EternusIV]

WKE - My nephews immediately piped: "MewTwo! MewTwo! MewToo!" when they saw your icon (they are at the loveable age where they hang around and watch everything you do)

 

Being old enough to read some of this stuff, they were also mesmerized (no pokemon reference intended ) by Sha'thar roleplaying and icons That's a 100% compliment

 

Pandaemonium -- sounds right to me. I put a link on this board a while back about Dyson Spheres. I think mileage varies according to what the sphere is made of, however. The original design is already obsolete from a materials standpoint?

 

 

 

 

I HOPE the AU's come into play more than being nifty statistics for astrophysics buffs.

 

Perhaps the AUs are distance modifiers for long range weapon/MDD attacks? THAT would be scary......

 

 

 

 

Low-Runger: "Sir - an alien fleet has just warped into our system!"

 

High-Runger: "That gives us a couple of turns to mount a defense! Hurry, alert the shipyards and send word to production to stop producing all those Advanced Consumer Goods and Rare **********************"

 

<< Warning Sirens are eliminated by a tremendous shockwave from a MDD device launched from the farthest warp point in the system, heaving infrastructure about as if it were loose dirt.....massive casulaties.....a dark and unexpected day for the Everlasting Spawn. The crews aboard the massive orbital fortresses can only watch the devastation in horror from above the atmosphere..... >>

[Ur Lord Tedric]

Anyway, a friend in the game brought up the point that distances of Warp Points may also be important in how soon one gets word of incoming ships, if scanning from a homeworld. That is to say, someone with only medium range sensors might not be able to see someone arriving at a very distant WP.

 

Interestingly we've just put a question to the Oracle about how our XSENS order failed to detail anything about the Alien Fleet at the same location, but did indeed notice something as careful analysis of the printout showed that the "No Alien Fleets detected here" message didn't appear.....

 

And we know they were there because they MOVE'd in earlier in the turn.........

 

Lord High Seneschal to Ur-Lord Tedric

[PhaseDragon]

My first theory about the AU distance of warp points was that they modify the difficulty of the Warp Survey by correlating to the "Distance" modifier applied to Warp points. This modifier is what makes some D class warp points slightly harder than others because the distance to the end of the warp point makes it more difficult to survey. Still, I haven't created any formulas since there is no perceivable pattern as of yet (at least not by me anyway).

[RTGPete]

Anyway, a friend in the game brought up the point that distances of Warp Points may also be important in how soon one gets word of incoming ships, if scanning from a homeworld. That is to say, someone with only medium range sensors might not be able to see someone arriving at a very distant WP.

 

Interestingly we've just put a question to the Oracle about how our XSENS order failed to detail anything about the Alien Fleet at the same location, but did indeed notice something as careful analysis of the printout showed that the "No Alien Fleets detected here" message didn't appear.....

 

And we know they were there because they MOVE'd in earlier in the turn.........

 

Lord High Seneschal to Ur-Lord Tedric

Ahhh I found it - the SENS (XSENS - same thing) order would generate the "No alien fleets are detected here" message if it found an empty fleet from any empire. It shouldn't do that, as empty fleets aren't supposed to show up ever. I've eliminated that line from the code so that there is no way to distinguish a totally unoccupied (by aliens) location and one that has at least one empty fleet.

 

Thanks for pointing this one out