witch space transit times

cmdr drayton · Post by **cmdr drayton** » Fri Sep 22, 2006 4:17 pm

I'm pretty sure this has been answered ages ago, I have a vague recollection of the answer, but I'm trying to confirm it and searching the forum has drawn a blank!.... anyhow....

How much time does it take to do a hyperspace jump between systems? I have a feeling someone said that it was the square of the distance, so therefore doing lots of little jumps will get you to where you're going faster than a few big ones. Is this the case?

This would be something that could usefully be added to the manual about jumps, since it affects route planning strategy quite a alot, when taking passengers or contracts. Or is this something that commanders are expected to figure out for themselves?

johnsmith · Post by **johnsmith** » Fri Sep 22, 2006 9:49 pm

I have no idea either. But I'd love to know how times are calculated so I can finish this OXP. The plot demands you do it against the clock, but I can't work out how.

cmdr drayton · Post by **cmdr drayton** » Fri Sep 22, 2006 10:34 pm

This makes me think of tool which would be very useful, which is a route planner in the galaxy map. So you can plot a route, and keep it marked on the map. The most critical part though is the ability to measure the distance between any two abitrary systems. It's a pain in the backside to plan a long route only to find that half way there's a 7.1ly jump needed, forcing you to backtrack.

Being able to work out in advance how long the jumps would take and total that would be neat, but maybe would take too much of the risk out. Perhaps that's better left to experience.

cmdr drayton · Post by **cmdr drayton** » Fri Sep 22, 2006 10:44 pm

or maybe just display the galaxies like this....

Uncle Reno · Post by **Uncle Reno** » Sat Sep 23, 2006 8:03 am

Here you go, the explanation is here, hope it helps.

Nice galaxy map by the way, are those easy to come up with?

cmdr drayton · Post by **cmdr drayton** » Sat Sep 23, 2006 8:18 am

Thanks, that's exactly what I was looking for. So now I know doing lots of small jumps will get me there faster! That's good to know.

As for the maps, I found them here...

http://www.excessus.demon.co.uk/elite/connectivity.html

They are very helpful in the route planning! Although if the galaxy map added this it would be even better.

Perhaps it's time for me to get into the code again! Yikes!

cmdr drayton · Post by **cmdr drayton** » Sat Sep 23, 2006 11:41 am

So I thought I'd take a look at the code, and see if I could add this, and I found that there's already something very much like this in there!!

If you go to the long range start chart and type ! then it saves a connection map as a tiff file in the same folder as Oolite. It's not quite as direct as having it in there all the time (which I think I'll still have a go at) and it has a load of other stuff on there (I'm guessing to help debug things) but it's quite useful!

Give it a try!

Now all I have to do is find where the galaxy map is drawn!

cmdr drayton · Post by **cmdr drayton** » Sat Sep 23, 2006 1:01 pm

Ok, here's what it looks like...

What do people think?

lex_talionis · Post by **lex_talionis** » Sat Sep 23, 2006 1:16 pm

I like that. Maybe add a function that allows you to find out the distance between two separate systems, which could integrate with something that allows you to click on the 'lines' between systems to work out a route. I have looking at two stars on the map and wondering 'how much fuel am I going to have if I jump that? Indeed, am I going to get there and discover that I can't jump that at all?'

Looking good man, I like the way the lines aren't too obtrusive. Have they been assigned a keystroke, or do they come up as default?

cmdr drayton · Post by **cmdr drayton** » Sat Sep 23, 2006 1:59 pm

I've just got them coming up by default at the moment, but I don't think it would be a big deal to get them to only appear with a keystroke. I suppose the other thing would be should this be an upgrade that you have to buy, an advanced navigation system of some sort?

Clicking on lines would be tricky I think, especially in some of those very dense areas, eg slightly left of top middle. My original thought was also to measure distances, but what I was really aiming for was not getting stuck in deadends, which this does more effectively I think, so I'm not sure the complexity of a full route planner is worth it after all.

As for the unobstrusiveness, that was what I was going for, glad you think it's working, although I wonder if it could stand to be darkened a bit more. Looks brighter on an LCD than on a CRT so maybe not.

johnsmith · Post by **johnsmith** » Sat Sep 23, 2006 4:56 pm

Great idea. Also think it should be an optional extra though, as it makes navigaton just too darn easy.

Also, is this hard-coded to 7LY? I'm not in favour of changing the max witch space fuel, but there are those who are. What will this mean for them?

cmdr drayton · Post by **cmdr drayton** » Sat Sep 23, 2006 6:17 pm

It's hard coded at the moment, but would be easy to change. One argument in favour of increasing the range beyond 7ly is that some galaxies have systems you can't get to with 7ly jumps. Not sure how long a jump would be needed, possibly not much more than 7ly.

But if you increase it from 7 ly you get something like this... which ends up making the galaxy feel much smaller since there aren't and little cul-de-sacs any more.

8ly

9ly

At 5.9ly you get a broken galaxy...

So 7ly seems to be roughly optimal

themacman · Post by **themacman** » Sat Sep 23, 2006 9:10 pm

I should point out that the lines are pretty dark on my CRT and that I didn't even notice that the maps had been changed until a read more.

cmdr drayton · Post by **cmdr drayton** » Sat Sep 23, 2006 9:40 pm

Ok, I was aiming for as dark as possible, so it doesn't get in the way of other things. Are you on Windows, MacOS or Linux? The screen gamma settings are different, so Windows tends to look darker. Not sure what Linux is like in that respect. I'll lighten it up a bit, but not tooo much!

themacman · Post by **themacman** » Sun Sep 24, 2006 3:23 am

I'm on Panther with an iMac G3 so somewhat old. I agree that it shouldn't be too bright, but a little brighter would be nice.