Oolite Bulletins

I don't know if this relates to the Tori oxp or Oolite in general, but:

Normally, you can't hyperspace less than 10km from a space station.
For Tori, it is a much larger distance, nearer 20-25km.

Is this deliberate?

Wiggy wrote:

I don't know if this relates to the Tori oxp or Oolite in general, but:

Normally, you can't hyperspace less than 10km from a space station.
For Tori, it is a much larger distance, nearer 20-25km.

Is this deliberate?

Deliberate? Probably not.
Annoying? Most certainly!

I think it has to do with the station's radius, which in the tori stations is pretty big on account of the rotating arms.

Wiggy wrote:

I don't know if this relates to the Tori oxp or Oolite in general, but:

Normally, you can't hyperspace less than 10km from a space station.
For Tori, it is a much larger distance, nearer 20-25km.

Is this deliberate?

The Transhab also has this effect, Witch-out is at 15km+.

Captain Hesperus

Occasionally I've been blocked with "Too Close to Leveithan" or even "Too Close to Witchspace Beacon". Suspect Oolite calculates the blocking range by reference to the size or volume of the model. The Tori stations are massive models, so I guess have a massive field of influence.

i thought it made sense with the torus. not so much with the transhab. i'm debating attempting a dyson sphere. that should put the pincers on the witchout point! that would be something to see if something caused the station to shoot off at high speed and slammed into the sphere wall. which would then cause the sphere to hit the sun / planet.... hmmmm.

nijineko wrote:

i thought it made sense with the torus. not so much with the transhab.

The arms are longer even than the tori... It must be related to the dimensions.

i'm debating attempting a dyson sphere.

I believe Charlie wanted to do a Dyson sphere for the Orb, but was eventually defeated on his intent... I don't recall exactly why, but it was impossible to do it. Search the archives, you may find out what happened.

i will see what i can do. now it's a challenge! =D any tips for model size to final oolite size?

Wanted to post this in appropriate thread but can't find it.

Love the Torus station! Love injecting between the spokes both on arrival and departure. But some space faring NPC commanders seem to have trouble either moving about or docking with them. Every time I have arrived have either witnessed collisions or the aftermath - floating pods. I find this very curious and wonder if I am the only one to notice this?

CaptSolo wrote:

Wanted to post this in appropriate thread but can't find it.

Love the Torus station! Love injecting between the spokes both on arrival and departure. But some space faring NPC commanders seem to have trouble either moving about or docking with them. Every time I have arrived have either witnessed collisions or the aftermath - floating pods. I find this very curious and wonder if I am the only one to notice this?

Frequently, yes. It seems to happen more often at the torus stations, but not exclusively.

I like to find a nice double torus and hide between the discs during a furball. Quite amusing.

CaptSolo wrote:

Love the Torus station! Love injecting between the spokes both on arrival and departure.

Thrilling, isn't it.

CaptSolo wrote:

But some space faring NPC commanders seem to have trouble either moving about or docking with them. Every time I have arrived have either witnessed collisions or the aftermath - floating pods. I find this very curious and wonder if I am the only one to notice this?

The damage on collision is based on the other mass and as the torus station has an immense mass, even the slightest touch with the docking bay may lead to death. I remember the docking of the Armadillo. That ship was originally a bit to big for the dock. It had no problems docking at normal stations but always died when docking at the torus stations.

Its a bit of a bug that the mass that does damage is not maximised. Surely its true that hitting a single beer can with your car does less damage than hitting a full six-pack. But hitting a concrete block of 100 ton probably will damage your car just in the same way as hitting a 1000 ton concrete block.

Since the concrete blocks are stationary in both cases the KE of the impact is all from the car, so it should be capped out at the speed which the car hits the block(s) - could this be translated into Oolite code somehow?

Scraping the docking bay in particular should be mostly glancing blows...for even less damage than max.

Switeck wrote:

Scraping the docking bay in particular should be mostly glancing blows...for even less damage than max.

Hmm. Part of the Elite learning experience is learning how to dock - space craft are not built of cast-iron but space station docks much be made to be VERY tough and will be unforgiving.

Have you ever seen someone get a 'glancing blow' from a concrete pillar in a multi-storey car park? The gentlest scrape = at least 4 replacement panels. And space ships, even the Adder, are BIG compared to a car.

I think it is right that the gentlest touch of a docking bay should be a noisy, jarring, scary experience and anything more than that should result in total structural failure and death in the vacuum of space.

Garibaldi: So, how long until he hits jump?
Ivanova: [working her console] Oh, right about…now!
[the ship goes through the jump gate without incident]
Garibaldi: No boom?
Sinclair: No boom.
Ivanova: No boom today. Boom tomorrow. There's always a boom tomorrow.
[Sinclair and Garibaldi exchange an exasperated look and wander off.]
Ivanova: What?! Look, somebody's got to have some damn perspective around here. Boom. Sooner or later. BOOM!

DaddyHoggy wrote:

Since the concrete blocks are stationary in both cases the KE of the impact is all from the car, so it should be capped out at the speed which the car hits the block(s) - could this be translated into Oolite code somehow?

Hitting an object in space is of cause different than a concrete block. When you hit something, it will be pushed backwards. Only big stations have a big inertia. When the speed of pushing the station away is very much slower than the deformation speed of the ships hull, the size of the station will not be important anymore. So for a good simulation you need parameters about deformation in your calculations.

Anyhow, I forgot that scratch damage inside the docking corridor only depends on ship speed, not on station mass. That big stations do much more damage, probably means that ships already get scratch damage before entering the corridor.

Could debris around a Torus station also be caused by NPCs trying to fly through the wheel and failing (because they're too slow for the turning wheel and are cut in half or something)?