Star System building 101

[cocoa-jin]

Ok look, if you havent realized it yet, Im a nerd...and unfortunatly, it means i have nerdy expectations for things regarding science, space, Trek...i cant help it.

One thing i'd like to see is the devs use an accurate, informed, intelligent way of building systems...even coding these general guidlines to even the randomly built systems.

The things is, there are general guide lines for how a solar system is built. There are certainly exceptions to the rules and i embrace those exceptions provided they arent the norm...and even more so if these exceptions are applied intelligently to provide interesting content, cause & affect, back ground story.

I recognize that many wouldnt notice descrepencies in system design, but some of us will...and I know it would personally erk me to see it in Trek...I guess I just expect more from Trek, we are supposed to be the intelligent sci-fi fans right? Im not asking for any intensive content, or game mechanics shredding changes...it only requires an informed artist and some code for randomly generated systems.

What I personally dont want to see is stuff like [edit*]too many[*edit] gas giants in the inner orbits with [edit*]too many[*edit] rocky planets in the outer orbits...or too many binary systems choked full of planets and gas giants...or planets with Earth type temperatures outside the "life belt" orbital ranges for the type of star.

Basic guidlines:
The bigger the star, the farther out the "life belt" orbital area is(Earth type temps)

Binary star systems tend to consume most planet building material into the two sibling stars

NEBULAS ARE MASSIVLY EXPANSIVE...they are the stuff multiple star systems/star clusters are made of...so they are frequently bigger than a solar system. Please make some nebulas systems of their own or massive if not dominating features of a system.

Nebulas tend to be where mature stars are not...remnants wont be close to a mature star...perhaps on the outskirts/in or beyond the ort-cloud.

Red giants will frequently consume a significant amount of the inner orbits so we can expect to have higher concentrations of gas giants

Black holes dominate large areas of a system

Intelligent exceptions:
some causes for a rocky planets out in outer orbits could be due to a rogue planet that was sent out into a non-standard orbit by some force...like pluto getting chucked out of its original orbit.

"Hot Jupiters"...good one guys

Rogue bodies(celestials on the move out of orbit, orbits disrupted, non co-planar orbits, etc)

Disturbed/Disrupted solar system...maybe due to the passage of a massive external rogue body or cataclysmic events(novas, super novas, other massive solar discharges, etc)

***I'll come up with more...I ran out of time***

[Beaver8]

You do realize this is a game right? Reality is altered quite a bit to fit in with what makes things fun. They can not have everything real life and if it makes you mad because an asteriod is coming from a place in space that would have been sucked up by a moons gravity altering the path of it so it wouldn't be in the area it is currently in, or if there is a color that is slightly offscale to something true then you will be disappointed.

I know they will do their best to keep things within a realism range but not perfect, because things that are exact can put a damper on the fun level of the game. What they want is a fun and playable game not an astrology book. They have some pretty smart people working to make things as real as possible but when it's all said and done, fun and playability beats reality.

I can just see it now, people measuring distances from point A to point B and calculating how much gravity there will be in the exact mid point then complaining how there is something in the center that shouldn't be there and bla bla bla.

I guess there shouldn't be any sounds or fire in ship combat either right? So when you fire a torpedo and when it impacts another ship it shouldn't make any noise, and I guess there shouldn't be any pretty fires from the explosion becuase it wouldn't be real.

Well just know that to be a success they need to folllow this simple formula....... FUN > REALISM

[ramjam380]

I strongly agree--just as Kestrel is putting a lot of care into aligning the politics of the Star Trek universe to give a real sense of immersion, I hope that the geography of the space we have is constructed with reasonable considerations for actual astronomy, to the degree that it remains immersive and fun.

You're clearly not the only nerd here, and it has to be expected that there will be a lot of nerdy players that know more about space science than average--players that would be annoyed by blatant ignorance of astronomy.

To add to yours:

-Asteroid belts can be less cluttered than we have seen in the screens so far.

-Planets should have a real sense of size, especially gas giants.

-It would be nice if there is a link between space and planetary environments; you beam down to a planet with two moons orbiting a red star, and you look up to see the moons reflecting the light of a red sun.

[Loekii]

As a non-nerd, I also agree. :p

So long as it doesn't make the game tedious, stuff like this shouldn't be an issue. Gamers generally will not care, so long as they are having fun, and that is the bottom-line.

It is sort of like using real life physics and what not, in a movie, rather than just making it all up.

Heaven forbid they get a subliminal education out of the game.

[The.Grand.Nagus]

You do realize this is a game right?

QFE. If everything were "realistic", then we shouldnt be able to go faster than the speed of light. Quit trying to over-think everything and simply let yourself be entertained :o

[Thibor]

You do realize this is a game right? Reality is altered quite a bit to fit in with what makes things fun.

You realize it's Cocoa-Jin right? :D
Sorry Cocoa, couldn't resist.

As to the second sentence I snipped out, and to take it further, reality gets "altered" very frequently as we continue to learn new things and find that things we once held to be true no longer are.

A favorite movie quote of mine:
"1500 years ago, everybody knew that the earth was the center of the universe. 500 years ago, everybody knew that the earth was flat. And 15 minutes ago, you knew that humans were alone on this planet. Imagine what you'll know tomorrow."

Sorry Cocoa but I have to ask, what makes you think the "laws" we currently have on our silly little planet are 100% accurate and held true across the entire galaxy/universe? How many scientific theories get thrown out years/decades/centuries later because of new discoveries? Or, how many get amended to account for things that the previous theory/law can't account for?

Simple example ... Newton's laws couldn't explain the discrepancies found in Mercury's orbit at the end of the 1800s and it wasn't until Einstein's General Theory of Relativity around 1915 that did.

The genre this game falls into has two key words ... "science" and "fiction". And while I'm all for incorporating known science into the game, I have zero problem with the developers adapting it to suit their needs for gameplay or story to make it fun.

And let me ask this:
Would you have a problem with them introducting non-carbon-based intelligent species?
I mean afterall it's canon in that the Horta ("The Devil in the Dark": TOS) were silicon based. Yet it's speculative at best, based on our current science, whether something like that could exist.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I'd be happy if they simply tossed out all of our science and created their own like those writing fantasy create a magic system. But, I do think you're being close minded in thinking that how we currently see things working are the only ways things work throughout the universe. And, that it would be foolish to nitpick over those types of things in a sci-fi game.

[cocoa-jin]

You do realize this is a game right? Reality is altered quite a bit to fit in with what makes things fun. They can not have everything real life and if it makes you mad because an asteriod is coming from a place in space that would have been sucked up by a moons gravity altering the path of it so it wouldn't be in the area it is currently in, or if there is a color that is slightly offscale to something true then you will be disappointed.

I know they will do their best to keep things within a realism range but not perfect, because things that are exact can put a damper on the fun level of the game. What they want is a fun and playable game not an astrology book. They have some pretty smart people working to make things as real as possible but when it's all said and done, fun and playability beats reality.

I can just see it now, people measuring distances from point A to point B and calculating how much gravity there will be in the exact mid point then complaining how there is something in the center that shouldn't be there and bla bla bla.

I guess there shouldn't be any sounds or fire in ship combat either right? So when you fire a torpedo and when it impacts another ship it shouldn't make any noise, and I guess there shouldn't be any pretty fires from the explosion becuase it wouldn't be real.

Well just know that to be a success they need to folllow this simple formula....... FUN > REALISM

Just because the basic designs of the system are relasitic, doesnt mean the systems cant be interesting and fun. having properly designed systems doesnt eliminate the possibilty of rogue asteroids, or black holes or some smaller nebulas or anamolies or interesting planets with interesting life forms.

Nor does it require modeling or calculating gravitational fields/interactions. It doesnt require anything but a good sense and approximation of how things ought to be.

So understanding the rocky/dense materials settle near the center of gravity(inner orbits) in a system is no different than knowing a cereal box full of rubber balls and lead bearings will likly have the the more dense bearings settling at the bottom of the box.(closest point to earth's gravity)...or that the dense iron and nickle cores of these rocky planets is due to the more dense material settling at the center of their gravity.

How would putting planets where they ought to be detract from fun? If it isnt a hinderance to fun or a large work load for the devs...why not make it right, while remaining fun?

[NeoWolf]

The Creators of Trek had an attention to this kind of detail for the shows, I don;t see why that cannot transalte to the game. The plausibility factor is one element of Trek that appeals to some Trek fans, myself included.

If Trek could use known rules, and plausible theories and give them enough twist and fluff alongside them to make it enjoyable I doubt Cryptic will have anymore difficulty.

Of course that which we know as fact today is invariably disproved as fiction tommorrow so some artistic license is okay too..

[thefreshjedi]

The game design is already in place. I don't see how hard it would be to give realistic mathematic principles and functions to an already working game system. It's just a bunch of mathematical expressions and functions which tell a solar system how to render itself.

Flatfingers is much better at this than I am, but you just have to build a bunch of arrays which tell the game system how to render solar systems. If you give each planet type a specific set of variables and then tell the game system to adhere to these variables, then it wouldn't be too hard to simulate what Cocoa is describing here. It's just setting the rules and testing them to make sure the core system is adhering to the correct placement of the planetary bodies.

Especially if they already are using physics in their game engine, then all the have to do is elaborate how each object relates to that main physics engine. The mathematics then "learn" to adjust themselves accordingly.

-avery

[cocoa-jin]

You realize it's Cocoa-Jin right? :D
Sorry Cocoa, couldn't resist.

As to the second sentence I snipped out, and to take it further, reality gets "altered" very frequently as we continue to learn new things and find that things we once held to be true no longer are.

A favorite movie quote of mine:
"1500 years ago, everybody knew that the earth was the center of the universe. 500 years ago, everybody knew that the earth was flat. And 15 minutes ago, you knew that humans were alone on this planet. Imagine what you'll know tomorrow."

Sorry Cocoa but I have to ask, what makes you think the "laws" we currently have on our silly little planet are 100% accurate and held true across the entire galaxy/universe? How many scientific theories get thrown out years/decades/centuries later because of new discoveries? Or, how many get amended to account for things that the previous theory/law can't account for?

Simple example ... Newton's laws couldn't explain the discrepancies found in Mercury's orbit at the end of the 1800s and it wasn't until Einstein's General Theory of Relativity around 1915 that did.

The genre this game falls into has two key words ... "science" and "fiction". And while I'm all for incorporating known science into the game, I have zero problem with the developers adapting it to suit their needs for gameplay or story to make it fun.

And let me ask this:
Would you have a problem with them introducting non-carbon-based intelligent species?
I mean afterall it's canon in that the Horta ("The Devil in the Dark": TOS) were silicon based. Yet it's speculative at best, based on our current science, whether something like that could exist.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I'd be happy if they simply tossed out all of our science and created their own like those writing fantasy create a magic system. But, I do think you're being close minded in thinking that how we currently see things working are the only ways things work throughout the universe. And, that it would be foolish to nitpick over those types of things in a sci-fi game.

I did say I embrace exceptions, because Im certain they exist. What Im hoping to see is a general trend toward what we know now as truth/law/normal and apply them as norms...not neccessarily at the exclusion of the rare.

But come on, we wont see a Jupiter sized gas giant around a mature star at ranges like mercury, why? because the solar radiation wouldnt allow such a gas giant to exhist, it would blow all the gases away. In addition, before the gas giant even had a chance to gather, the proto-star/coalescing core would absorb such a massive object at close range and added it to its center...making it apart of the eventual star.

It doesnt require gravitational models or anything fancy(like some fear is needed) to realize that...just knowledge of how things "generally" work...and then not put a gas giant near the star.

And yes, I can accept non-carbon based, non-oxygen, non-water based, non-bipedal intelliegnt life.:)

The thing is, following current "norms" doesnt have to exclude the possibility of the exotic...but randomly generated system anatomies would just be a sign of laziness, slopiness and/or ignorant design. If you are going to do it, at least take the time learn how to do it right and apply that knowledge accuratly and creativly...its just good work ethic and pride. And im not suggesting the devs dont have this ethic and pride in their work.

If it cant be done efficiently or effectivly then they have to do what they can.

Consider this, it may be possible to have a binary star system with one of the stars being a black hole...but lest consider the impact of that. Odds are their wouldnt be enough material around to make much else in system, the inner orbits would likly be full of unrealized planets that couldnt handle the gravitational shearing and tidal forces of orbiting around a central center of gravity of both stars while being acted upon by dratsically changing gravitational forces as the two stars orbit each other and move back in force in distance to the orbits. This would likly mean lots of comets, and rogue asteroids. Any planet capable of coalescing into a planet would likly be in the far outer orbits and would likly consist mostly of gases(though a solid/metallic core is possible...but with the lack of avilable material to contruct them(the two stars tookit all), we might not expect nothing more than a few planets...unless the original gas cloud that made up the system was extra-ordinarily massive. Life might be hard fought to sapwn in the system with the radically changing orbits and gravitational forces...plus with the death and collapse of the 2nd star, there is a lot less warming radiation to provide an hospitable habitat for the far flung planets that do exist. If so, we'd see life forms adapted to very cold temperatures and rapdily changing and chaoti seasons, well as much of a season as one can have on a frigid gaseous and/or frozen planet. There might be liquid deeper toward the core, but it would be dense and devoid of sunlight. Life forms relying on thermal heat and radiation to power the cycle of life. Lets just hope there is enough heavy radioactive isotopes that far out in the orbits to to help keep that core molten and churning, plus the tidal affects of the two massive stars just migh keep the thermal heat and radiation going long enough to give life a chance to bloom before the core dies, rendering the planet a frozen husk....and thats just off the top of my head.

[Interdictor]

There really is no set solar system template. We have ours with our Terrestrial planets, Gas giants and Ice giants all neatly arranged. Then there are systems with gas giants several times the size of Jupiter whipping around their star closer and faster than Mercury does in ours (http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081204074652.htm). Then you have binary or trinary systems with no visible sattelites. And the list goes on.

Basically, as long as they follow some basic gravitational rules, they could come up with any kind of arrangement and there is probably something actually like it in the trillions upon trillions of solar systems in the universe.

[Manx]

I'm not too fussed about having working model solar systems in STO; but there is one thing about some of the pics we have seen that has always bugged me. Anyone else noticed the asteroid rings around some of the planets? I thought they were a nice touch at first. Then I noticed that I could clearly see them dissapearing around the horizon. Ever scince then, the planets have looked way too small; ST Legacy kind of small.

I do think that a proper sense of scale is important in a space game. A planet should be an awsome sight from orbit; anyone who has played one of the X3 games (or seen pics of the Earth from the space station or shuttles) knows what I mean. A nebula should be a startling and spectacular backdrop (rather than just make space a funny colour). A black hole should look like something that can tear apart entire solar systems. It is the scale of the things you find in space that give them their sense of majesty.

That's why 'astronomical' means both 'of astronomy' and 'very large'.

[indigowhale345]

I agree 100% with Thibor on this. This is Star Trek. It is science fiction. It routinely bends if not breaks the laws of physics, and STO should be no different.

Further, as he rightly pointed out, our knowledge is ever changing. Our knowledge of things outside our solar system is extremely limited. Certainly there are reasons our solar system is the way it is. But that doesn't mean there can't be reasons it could be completely different as well.

But probably the best reason not to do this is the repetitiveness and loss of creativity when you hamstring yourself like this. How many times will we be seeing the same solar system pattern over and over and over again? Inner rocky planets, outer gassy planets, and maybe some rings or Kuiper belt style objects like Pluto and Xena. Again and again and again. And again. Its too predictable, the only variables as to how many planets of each type there are.

And by the way, what about Kuiper belt objects? They are all rocky things, even if they are not classified as planets, and supposedly formed beyond all the less dense gas giants.


Bottom line, I want to see imagination. Give us a sci-fi explanation for it, a bit of hand waving sure, but give us some variety. How about a solar system with objects that have the orbital path of a taco shell? What kind of strange convergence caused that system to be like it is? That's where things get interesting, even if they are wildly improbable. Otherwise things will just get boring seeing the same thing over and over with minor variations, but space isn't boring, and neither is Star Trek.

[cocoa-jin]

Dont get me wrong, Im not against exceptions...just let them be exceptional in their rate of inclusion.

Also note...that the gas giants whipping around at close orbits are associated with red dwarf suns...these are small, slow burning, low light/radiating suns. They likly dont have the solar winds required to blow the gas giant away, plus their gravitational pulls would likly consist of small orbits...they likly have hard time holding anything else at farther ranges. The massive giant whipping around it likly could have been a wimpy sibiling star if there was enough marterial left and its existance is likly due the red dwarf being so small and insignificant the gas giant was able to successfully wrangle gases from the dwarf during its proto-stage.

The other giants were shown in non co-planar orbits and/or extremly eccentric orbits...so their origins and present location near the star is likly due to some other forces outside of "typical" system development.

These are exceptions...I embrace their existance...and there or good, unusual and wide open for creative causes the devs can exploit...but just about every system made up of randomly placed planets is sloppy.

[Meehile]

As a non-nerd...

Liar!!!:D

I submit to the court the very fact that you are here posting as evidence for my case.

[Azurian]

But come on, we wont see a Jupiter sized gas giant around a mature star at ranges like mercury, why? because the solar radiation wouldnt allow such a gas giant to exhist, it would blow all the gases away. In addition, before the gas giant even had a chance to gather, the proto-star/coalescing core would absorb such a massive object at close range and added it to its center...making it apart of the eventual star.

Eh Cocoa, hate to tell you but there are Jupiter-sized objects in close to stars, like Mercury. They are called "Hot Jupiters".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_Jupiter

In fact they appear to be very common type of exoplants. Of all the star systems within a 60LY distance away, 20 "Hot Jupiters" have been discovered out of 45 planets. And no, not all of these are Red Dwarfs. ;)



Now back to your thread. With Star Systems, I want to see a variety. I want to see stars going from the rare Hypergiants to brown dwarfs. And seeing them in not only binary, trinary, but also the rare multiple systems (which do exist).

Planets, I want to see Hot Jupiters all the way to frozen worlds, where we have to wear life support suits to explore on. After all planets change over time and we might encounter a planet that has ruins on it and its in the middle of a volcanic field or perhaps a long abandoned outpost on some lone frozen world that was long forgotten.

These are the worlds I really want to explore, not the mundane and common M-Class world of Star Trek.

[Flatfingers]

I hereby award one (1) strip of gold-pressed latinum to anyone who quietly thought to him- or herself, "Oh, there is just no way that Flatfingers will be able to resist dumping some of his usual long-winded mumbo-jumbo into this thread." :D

Point 1: After only about 15 or so posts, this thread is already being turned into yet another "simulationists versus gamists" debate. Haven't we had enough of those here?

I'd like to think we could take it as granted that pretty much all of us hope that Star Trek Online will have great gameplay. If so, then who does it hurt if we also knock around a few ideas about how planets might be implemented semi-realistically? Star Trek was, after all, a science fiction show -- as long as the gameplay of STO stays good, and certain things (like planets and stars) have to be implemented anyway, why shouldn't we be able to constructively discuss how that could be accomplished in a plausibly realistic way?

If people still want to rehash that old "fun > reality" argument, they're free to do so. But it would be nice if we could have one thread where ideas for "reality = fun" could be discussed in addition to all the completely valid "rules-based gameplay = fun" threads.

Point 2a: Of course we don't fully understand reality. Look at the issue of whether "hot Jupiters" can form to their primary stars as close as (or closer than) Mercury is to our own Sun -- that's a belief about planetary formation we've had to rethink just in the past few years. How many other things will we have to rethink?

That said, we still have to do the best we can with what we know (or think we know) today. Tomorrow we might learn that it's wrong, but this isn't tomorrow yet. So it's OK to try to do world-building based on what we know today, as long as we have the scientific humility to remain tentative in our beliefs about what we think we know.

Point 2b: There's reality, and there's Star Trek reality. Star Trek Online isn't going to be a game for NASA; it's a game based on the Star Trek universe, which includes some concepts that we call "science fiction." That doesn't mean they're complete fantasy -- it means they're fictional; they're things we don't consider possible today, but they're conceived and explored in a scientific fashion, which is radically different from just saying, "Oh, well, it's magic."

In science, there is a reason why things work the way they do. We may not know that reason (yet), but there is always a physically valid reason. So even if we imagine a faster-than-light drive technology, in a science fiction universe that drive works according to specific physical laws. And so does everything else: replicators, transporters, force fields, cyborgs, phasers, disruptors, and so on. It's science fiction... but there's science in that fiction.

All that leads up to an important point I want to try to make: the stuff in Star Trek that looks like science fiction to us is not presented as "exceptions" to our understanding of physical reality, but as extensions to our understanding. The futuristic technologies and phenomena aren't treated like inexplicable magic -- they're treated like science, like full and comprehensible parts of the universe obeying real laws that we just didn't happen to know yet.

I think that has a pretty simple implication for a MMORPG based on Star Trek: Star Trek physics adds to our current understanding of physics, rather than contradicting it. In other words, stuff in the game ought to act like stuff does in the real world, with the addition of Star Trek-specific stuff acting the way we've seen it act in Star Trek.

To put it another way, it's OK to simplify Kepler's laws of planetary motion for planets in a science fiction gameworld, but nothing in Star Trek ever completely broke those laws (by making all planets in the universe completely motionless), and Star Trek Online shouldn't break those laws, either.

The fact that some Star Trek stuff goes beyond what we know today about how the world works is not a justification for ignoring everything we know today.

Point 3: Depending on how motivated I get, I might offer some specific ideas for how star systems could be constructed for a Star Trek MMORPG.

In the meantime, there are some excellent references on this subject I can recommend:

MegaTraveller World Builder's Handbook by Joe D. Fugate, Sr., J. Andrew Keith, and Gary L. Thomas -- the first half is support stuff, but the second half is a great step-by-step system for generating plausible star systems, complete with stellar and planetary data, mineral and agricultural resources, lifeform types, and civilizational characteristics galore. Probably a little hard to find now, but well worth it to see how a system like this can work.

World-Building: A writer's guide to constructing star systems and life-supporting planets by Stephen L. Gillett -- not just "how-to" but "how," this book gets into why aspects of planetary systems look and behave the way they do. Excellent for understanding what might be worth simulating and how to go about doing that.

What If the Moon Didn't Exist? Voyages to Earths That Might Have Been by Neil F. Comins -- more an exploration of possibilities than a construction kit, this book describes various alternatives to our own Earth that might exist, and explains why others almost certainly wouldn't work (under our currently known science). A good resource for exercising the brain a bit to consider other kinds of planetary systems.

Space Math (http://www.ksc.nasa.gov/facts/faq04.html) -- a collection of constants, formulas, and resource pointers for all kinds of calculations related to space-based phenomena and behaviors.

The Orion's Arm Universe Project (http://www.orionsarm.com/main.html) -- a whole Web site dedicated to world-building! In particular check out The Sky on Alien Worlds (http://www.orionsarm.com/whitepapers/sky_on_alien_worlds.html), which discusses the science-based possibilities for the different colors and brightnesses that the skies of alien planets might have. Great stuff!--Flatfingers

[cocoa-jin]

Eh Cocoa, hate to tell you but there are Jupiter-sized objects in close to stars, like Mercury. They are called "Hot Jupiters".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_Jupiter

In fact they appear to be very common type of exoplants. Of all the star systems within a 60LY distance away, 20 "Hot Jupiters" have been discovered out of 45 planets. And no, not all of these are Red Dwarfs. ;)



Now back to your thread. With Star Systems, I want to see a variety. I want to see stars going from the rare Hypergiants to brown dwarfs. And seeing them in not only binary, trinary, but also the rare multiple systems (which do exist).

Planets, I want to see Hot Jupiters all the way to frozen worlds, where we have to wear life support suits to explore on. After all planets change over time and we might encounter a planet that has ruins on it and its in the middle of a volcanic field or perhaps a long abandoned outpost on some lone frozen world that was long forgotten.

These are the worlds I really want to explore, not the mundane and common M-Class world of Star Trek.

Your source also suggest they dont form in the location, they migrate there from the outer orbits. It also talks about their atmospheres being blown away...that'll likly leave a less than massive planet afterwards...making it just a typical rocky planet in the long term.

So even though there can be exceptions(or perhaps unstable/transient/abnormal variations) to the rule, gas giants are still outer orbit components, essentially migrating to their death into the star or being withered into small rocky planets in due time...unless its lucky enough to be a satellite of a weak puny star.

This also supports the evidence showing them also being non co-planar...or out of the normal orbital plane of the system/acretion disk created while the system was developing as a proto-system.

We are talking about destablinzing, wrenching and system distorting phenomena bring these giants into close proximity to their stars. We are talking about generally non-sustainable gas giants that would put these gas giants in a very temporary state when view on the scale of a systems life span.

So yes, there can be gas giants near stars...but its not the norm. But keep in mind, because we cant or have difficulty detecing planets other than gas giants, we likly have a hard time seeing the much larger percentage of systems that dont have gas giants in close proximity to stars.

For all we know mercury could have been a gas giant, but if so, we'd also see the gas giant stage doesnt last for long. The very act of having a gas giant close to your star tends to start the process of their not being a gas giant close to your star. Odds are, when you encounter a system, gas giants will be in the outer orbits because they start and frequently stay there, or some drift inward and eventually cease being gas giants.


*edit*
the wiki also says simulations suggest the passing of a gas giant through the inner orbits can help to influence large deposits of water in the inner planets that develop through its track. Wouldnt it be freaky if Mercury was a gas giant that sacrificed its massive stature to make life possible as we know it on Earth!?

[cocoa-jin]

There really is no set solar system template. We have ours with our Terrestrial planets, Gas giants and Ice giants all neatly arranged. Then there are systems with gas giants several times the size of Jupiter whipping around their star closer and faster than Mercury does in ours (http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081204074652.htm). Then you have binary or trinary systems with no visible sattelites. And the list goes on.

Basically, as long as they follow some basic gravitational rules, they could come up with any kind of arrangement and there is probably something actually like it in the trillions upon trillions of solar systems in the universe.

This gas giant is certainly an oddity... I wonder if its massive size has something to do with its ability to hold together.

Being 5 times the size of Jupiter may be reason enough. This is all speculation, but its mass could be strong enough to hold itself together inspite of the solar radiation blasting it. In fact, its possible the giant planet is massive enough to become a red dwarf or some other small, weak star...but its close proximity to the star's gravity is reducing the pressure on the core...reducing/countering the inward forces of gravity that would allow it to initiate nuclear fusion and start its nuclear furnace. So instead it remains in the shadow of its brightly shinning sibling...big enough to become a star in its own right, but forced to be a two-bit player instead. Not good enough to be a star, but too big to be blown away easily.

It turns out brown dwarfs have sufficient mass to start fusion...thats a lot gravity...and massive gas giants can enter that range. It may not be brown dwarf caliber, but it may be in a place where it could sustain its intergrity against its sibiling star.

So in this, I suspect this was a nearly binary system...and its likly their wont be much of anything left over to make much else in the solar system.

Still, interesting and compeling....

[Loekii]

I think that the foundation of the mapping system could be based upon real life astronomy, and then tweak it where it needs it, in-order to make it enjoyable.

Again, it is like how films hire technical advisers, even though the story is fiction.

[Crab66]

I'm sorry but realistic space or physics is probably the last thing you want in a game.

We understand far to little to make it realistic anyway.

And star trek is far from realistic to begin with.

[Flatfingers]

I'm sorry but realistic space or physics is probably the last thing you want in a game.

We understand far to little to make it realistic anyway.

And star trek is far from realistic to begin with.

What's your definition of "realistic"?

As I said a mere four posts upthread, there are two concerns here: Star Trek physics, and fun gameplay in a massively multiplayer persistent-world game.

To the first point, Star Trek -- as science fiction -- is portrayed not as breaking our current understanding of physics, but expanding it. So all our current science (where not specifically extended by Star Trek pseudoscience) still applies, including "planets revolve around stars."

To the second point, I can't speak for others but for Star Trek Online I've always advocated "semi-realism" for both the appearance and behavior of objects. That is, to the extent allowed by client/server technical issues and good design of rules-based gameplay, I think there needs to be just enough replication of certain aspects of physical reality to help players feel immersed in a working galaxy.

In other words, there's no need to implement every known law of physics. But some laws are worth implementing.

If you drop an object out of your inventory, should it just float there in mid-air? Or should it appear on the ground where it would if gravity existed? I hope you'd say "on the ground"... and I hope you'd understand that making that happen doesn't require storing the mass of every object, simulating the gravitational equation, and forcing all objects freely subject to gravity to describe parabolic arcs in their motion. The gameworld doesn't have to be "realistic" behind the scenes -- it just needs to be semi-realistic enough in certain things to create the appearance of a clockwork universe.

The same thing applies to planets. Cryptic doesn't have to solve the n-body problem in their behind the scenes server code. All that's necessary is some code that puts planets in plausible (circular) locations at different points in time. How that's achieved doesn't have to be "realistic" in the slightest; the goal is just semi-realism in what players see.

Again: actually implementing this would be more complex than what I've described here, absolutely.

But "world-building" (and the code to move these clockwork systems) absolutely would not be as difficult as some people seem to want to think it must be. And that is because a complete simulation of all real-world physics is not required.

...

Now, to get back to the actual topic -- here are the planetary classifications (http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Planetary_classification) considered (by Memory Alpha) to be canonical to Star Trek:

Class D: Planetoid or moon; uninhabitable (Paan Mokar, Regula)
Class H: Desert, cold (Tau Cygna V)
Class J: Gas giant (Jupiter, Saturn)
Class K: Adaptable with pressure domes (Mars, Mudd, Theta 116 VIII [Class K transjovian])
Class L: Marginally habitable (Indri VIII)
Class M: Terrestrial (Earth)
Class N: Sulfuric/reducing (Venus)
Class T: Gas giant
Class Y: "Demon" planet ("Silver Blood" planet)There are also some interesting non-canonical classifications from Star Trek: Star Charts (http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Star_Trek:_Star_Charts#Planetary_classification):

Class B: Geomorteus (Mercury)
Class I: Gas Supergiant ("hot Jupiters")
Class O: Pelagic (Azati Prime)
Class P: Glaciated (Andor, Exo III, Rigel X, Psi 2000)
Class R: Rogue (Dakala, Founders' homeworld)As is almost always the case, when I provide a long list like this, I am not saying, "I think all these should be implemented in the game." I'm listing these just to get a a sense of the possibilities. If all of them were implemented, wonderful; but I expect only a few would make it into a Star Trek MMORPG.

So the question is, which ones?

--Flatfingers

[ronaldheld]

I would expect to see some of the previously designed class of planets. How many away missions would be on non Class M planets?

[No1UKnow]

I have to agree. Everything should be totally as in real life. In fact:

If my avatar doesn't require a haircut on occasion, I'll be upset that the game play isn't real enough.

If my NPC crew doesn't pass gas once in awhile just as a real crew would, I'll be less of a nerd.

If I beam down to a planet and can't actually pluck the fruit from a tree, I'll realize this isn't really Star Trek.

There are billions of reasons why this game won't be all it can be, planet layout is most likely the least of them.

[LordDave]

Considering how little we actually know of the universe itself, it stands to reason that there are more combinations of planetary formation then we know. Billions of variables affect the outcome. And until we get out of our solar system and get some good data on the rest of the galaxy, Sci-Fi can do whatever they want.

[Hagon]

As long as it looks cool, hardly anyone will care. No need to have the devs wasting time pouring over astronomy books making sure they have minor details right. Star Trek is fantasy after all. No harm in having a fantastical universe where real rules don't apply. In fact having real rules not apply would make for a more enjoyable game for most I imagine.

[cocoa-jin]

Certainly the number of combinations are massive...but the basic guidlines are few. It doesnt much to understand the basics and apply them in the majority of systems...with artistic and content specifc liberties applied to some systems.

[Loekii]

Certainly the number of combinations are massive...but the basic guidlines are few. It doesnt much to understand the basics and apply them in the majority of systems...with artistic and content specifc liberties applied to some systems.

I agree.

From the sounds of it, it sounds like basically sticking to a specific formula when creating the map -- something that is basically done at the conceptual rendering, which is then used as the wire frame for the graphics.

[OrabIbo]

Only thing I'd like to see out of this is interactive elements that effect gameplay and how the ship functions.

such as Nebulas affecting your ships sensors. Planetary rings causing extra wear and tear on your shields, Black holes having gravity pull effects on your ship and if you get to close eventually pulling you in to your death, Planetary atmospheres that wear down your shields as well depending on your speed, Gas giants also doing the same but thicker and more extreme.

I'm not so interetested in the specifics, and exact numbers. Although I would like some stats to be available for science officers to report. such as, ambient temperature, seasonal effects, type, class, precentate of land vs. water. Etc...

[Azurian]

That reminds me of the old Starflight Game, where you had to scan a planet to see if it's safe to land and determine it's composition for certain elements. Which in STO, it would be really handy.

Class I: Gas Supergiant ("hot Jupiters")

Class I are not "Hot Jupiters", they are Gas Super-Giants. ;)

http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Star_Trek:_Star_Charts

[Thibor]

I think that the foundation of the mapping system could be based upon real life astronomy, and then tweak it where it needs it, in-order to make it enjoyable.

Again, it is like how films hire technical advisers, even though the story is fiction.

Why limit themselves to our own limited knowledge?
Afterall, we're no longer afraid of sailing over the edge of the ocean are we? ;)

And Flat, I don't know if your response regarding fun vs. realism was in any way directed at me but, I'm merely advocating that given the genre it's in, the devs should feel free to take what we currently know and surely use it to model some systems. But, they should also feel free to extrapolate on current ideas, bend them, warp them ... heck, take a stroll on the wild creative side and come up with something really bizarre.

[cocoa-jin]

Why limit themselves to our own limited knowledge?
Afterall, we're no longer afraid of sailing over the edge of the ocean are we? ;)

And Flat, I don't know if your response regarding fun vs. realism was in any way directed at me but, I'm merely advocating that given the genre it's in, the devs should feel free to take what we currently know and surely use it to model some systems. But, they should also feel free to extrapolate on current ideas, bend them, warp them ... heck, take a stroll on the wild creative side and come up with something really bizarre.

But you can have bizarre and still follow the "norms". You can have Binary systems with one star absorbing the other. You can have proto-systems, you can have celestial collisions, you can have large comets as orbiting bodies, you can various anamolies, you can have planets being torn apart by tidal forces, planets coalesing from a debris field, etc, etc.

But if you are going to to do something like tear a planet apart...have the appropriate massive bodies also in place so it isnt some random eye-candy without substance.

When building stand out systems, there should be a story behind them, a rhyme or reason. Even if we arent explicitly privy to the why(that could be part of and why we have explorers), the designer should have concept in mind. So as an explorer, I might enter the system, see the phenomenon and be able to examine the system and determine the story, the why.

[Thibor]

When building stand out systems, there should be a story behind them, a rhyme or reason. Even if we arent explicitly privy to the why(that could be part of and why we have explorers), the designer should have concept in mind. So as an explorer, I might enter the system, see the phenomenon and be able to examine the system and determine the story, the why.

That's all well and good. I just hope they don't base the astrometrics of 2409 simply on what we know today. We've gone from Newton's Law of Gravity being penned to having a manned space station in orbit in roughly the last 420ish years. It's mind boggling, especially given how fast technological advances are coming, what we're like to know ourselves as a species come 2409. I'm all for them developing star systems based on a reason. I just don't feel it has to be firmly tied to we hold true today.

[Flatfingers]

Class I are not "Hot Jupiters", they are Gas Super-Giants. ;)

You're right. I mistakenly believed that hot Jupiters were also significantly more massive than our Jupiter, but they're not.

Thanks for the correction!

And Flat, I don't know if your response regarding fun vs. realism was in any way directed at me but, I'm merely advocating that given the genre it's in, the devs should feel free to take what we currently know and surely use it to model some systems. But, they should also feel free to extrapolate on current ideas, bend them, warp them ... heck, take a stroll on the wild creative side and come up with something really bizarre.

I wasn't, exactly; I was trying to respond more to the general notion that Star Trek frequently and blindly "broke" what we think we know today about how the universe operates, and therefore that Cryptic should feel free to just invent anything they like.

Of course the Star Trek people often came up with some wild stuff. But most of the time, they did at least try to present each oddity not as some bizarre magical thing that operates according to some other set of laws, but as an expansion of what we know. In other words, most of Star Trek's stuff that breaks what we today believe to be physical laws is treated as science, not as magic.

If real science never mattered in Star Trek, why hire science advisers like Andre Bormanis, Naren Shankar, and (most recently) Carolyn Porco (http://trekmovie.com/2008/02/11/interview-with-star-treks-new-science-advisor/)?

While I, like cocoa-jin, am all for the developers imagining new phenomena for Star Trek Online, I think it matters that they do so in a Star Trek way: not lazily tossed off as some random magical thing that's not even given a pseudoscientific explanation, but as a natural phenomenon that operates -- and is shown to be operating -- according to valid scientific processes that we just haven't seen in action before, but which are reasonably consistent with everything else we've seen in the canonical Star Trek universe.

I absolutely think that can be done in a way that's fun as gameplay, respectful to Star Trek, and satisfying as science fiction. Why should we assume that these things have to be mutually exclusive? Why do some contributors to this thread seem to believe that even the mere appearance of physical plausibility is somehow so incredibly hard to do that it must be immediately dismissed as a consideration?

If the people working on this game aren't trying to create content that's good science fiction, good Star Trek, and good fun, then they're not trying hard enough.

Of course they might not succeed at that all the time. But what kind of quality will this game have if they lack the ambition to try to do justice to an IP that says "science is fun?"

Until I see otherwise, I'll give Cryptic the benefit of the doubt that they're designing and implementing "space" and the objects in it in Star Trek Online in a way that, while it takes some understandable liberties with reality for technical or artistic or Star Trek reasons, otherwise tries not to violate reasonable expectations about how the physical universe works.

Otherwise it's just Star Wars. :p

--Flatfingers

[MajorD]

They can base missions around oddities that don't conform to what we know about stellar formation. Finding a planet in a nebula can mean someone moved the planet into the nebula for some reason, and you get to go and investigate.

The simple rules can lead to very complex behavior, which can in turn point to very interesting plot elements by figuring out what should naturally be impossible. Take what is naturally implausible and make it performed by some group or being and you get a story.

[Hagon]

Why limit themselves to our own limited knowledge?
Afterall, we're no longer afraid of sailing over the edge of the ocean are we? ;)

And Flat, I don't know if your response regarding fun vs. realism was in any way directed at me but, I'm merely advocating that given the genre it's in, the devs should feel free to take what we currently know and surely use it to model some systems. But, they should also feel free to extrapolate on current ideas, bend them, warp them ... heck, take a stroll on the wild creative side and come up with something really bizarre.Totally agree. There's no need for realism in the sense it's being talked about here. If thay're going for realism, then most of the time we should be seeing nothing but black and distant stars, since that's essentially what it would be like really tooling through space most of the time.

[Arokh72]

Was away this weekend so sorry I'm late in to this debate. I'd like to bring back up a point that Flat made earlier in the piece about Sci Fi vs reality. Sci Fi usually takes liberties with reality but it also at times can have a base in reality or potential reality. For example at the of 2010, Jupiter was ignited to provide a chance for Europa to develop complex life. In reality if this happened and our system became binary, Earth and all the inner planets would be destroyed by both gravity and heat. Yet in this case Earth survives nicely, except there is no more night time. If reality was followed the entire series would have ended there and there would have been no 2061 or 3001. The reality is based in research that shows it is possible that Europa may support some for of simple underwater life....based on subterranean core movements providing sufficient convection currents to support life.

In saying, for myself, I want a systems to be realistic enough that they are able to provide strategic challenges in both PvE and PvP aspects of the game and also realistic enough that we don't start seeing the same planets/textures over and over again (how many space based have we seen that on?) On the other hand I want the systems to be "scifi" or unrealistic enough to be fun. At the end it is based on balance between realism, canon and fun.

A good example is I'd like it to be unrealistic enough to be able to fly across an ice ring leaving a bow wake like in the start sequence to Voyager.

BTW, since I'm rambling and trying to beat Flat for the largest amount of information in one post haha, Earth itself has been through many of the classifications Trek uses for much of it's life. For example we started off as a demon planet, we were and ocean world, an ice world, even a solid rocky mass of granite, heck we even had a green sky at one stage in the past (the atmosphere was rich with iron oxide at the time), long before we came even close to a class M world we know today.

[indigowhale345]

I absolutely think that can be done in a way that's fun as gameplay, respectful to Star Trek, and satisfying as science fiction. Why should we assume that these things have to be mutually exclusive? Why do some contributors to this thread seem to believe that even the mere appearance of physical plausibility is somehow so incredibly hard to do that it must be immediately dismissed as a consideration?

--Flatfingers


Why? Well I'm not sure who this question is aimed at, exactly, as I haven't seen any posts asking for magic systems which have no basis in reality. What I know I was responding to earlier in the thread is the way the original post implied that most systems should look just like ours. Maybe a few extra or fewer planets, but that they should all be recognizable as solar systems based on ours. And that is far more unrealistic than anything else.

Nothing in our limited knowledge of extra-solar systems gives us the right to presume what the majority of the universe looks like. We can figure out the processes that formed our system, and gave Uranus its odd tilt, and gave Pluto its unique orbit (and by the way, cocoa, rereading the OP, Pluto was never an inner ring planet tossed out, it was always a Kuiper belt object, just like the many other Kuiper belt objects, the rocky objects beyond the gas giants). But nothing in our knowledge can tell us how normal it really is.

What is normal? Counter-clockwise orbits, 0 degree inclinations to the star? Counter-clockwise rotations? Small angle tilted axes? Well, there are several moons in retrograde, clockwise orbits, even while other moons around the same planet have prograde orbits. Pluto and Eris orbit at an inclination to the solar plane. Venus' rotation is retrograde. Uranus' axis has it rotating on its side. Even our own solar system seems to break the norms.

We only have good data on our system and our system alone. Yes we can detect extra-solar planets, but we apparently haven't finished finding the big stuff in our neck of the woods, as the discovery of Eris (aka Xena) shows us. Eris is larger than Pluto, but wasn't discovered until 2005. Why did it take so long to find? Well its orbit is at a huge inclination, 44 degrees while Pluto is only 17 degrees, and the 8 "real" planets are at 0 degrees, and it orbits much further than Pluto.

We are still learning about our own solar system and its quirks. We have good theories, good science to explain why most of it is the way it is, but nothing says its normal or common in the universe. We have a lot of theories about what could or could not happen for the rest of the universe and its many solar systems, but when it comes down to it, STO has to make stuff up because we only have really good information on one lone solar system.


Now the point I think everyone can agree on is this: STO, however it goes about designing its star systems, ought to have the clues to explain why the wilder things are the way they are, and make them seem plausible. I think everyone disagrees on what exactly is wild and what isn't though. But there is still going to be a lot of hand waving. Its science fiction, and science we really don't have a lot of data on.

Do we need an explanation for every planet in a retrograde orbit? Or for every planet rotating on its side? Or for every planet with its orbit at a high inclination angle? Do we need an explanation for rocky planets beyond the gas giants? How about every system that is not likely to be around for very long, such as planets on eventual or even imminent collision courses or a gas giant getting eaten up by its star? Some things we should just accept as the way they are. I don't see a real problem with any of those things being left as is with no further explanation offered.

Maybe this thread should focus on what should really be explained and what is just 'normal'. Something with an orbit shaped like a taco shell ought to be explained, sure, but there's so many things I have no problem just taking at face value, like habitable planets in a trinary system.

[Loekii]

That's all well and good. I just hope they don't base the astrometrics of 2409 simply on what we know today. We've gone from Newton's Law of Gravity being penned to having a manned space station in orbit in roughly the last 420ish years. It's mind boggling, especially given how fast technological advances are coming, what we're like to know ourselves as a species come 2409. I'm all for them developing star systems based on a reason. I just don't feel it has to be firmly tied to we hold true today.

Theres basing it on 2009 knowledge, and then there is basing it on fantasy. For example, I hate the Mushroom forest screenshot. It looks sloppy and storybook.

I am not saying that we are restricted to 2009 knowledge, but rather Cryptic should use that as the foundation -- instead of randomly building things without purpose. In otherwords, lean towards current knowledge, when building the foundation and then dress it up from there.

[Hagon]

For my part I love the more whimsical, more fantastical like planetscapes we've seen so far. I like to feel like I'm playing a game when I'm playing a game, and those kinds of vistas help to do that a great deal.

I don't want reality. I want a lot of un-reality when I'm playing these games. For the most part games that try to be too real can be pretty boring (unless the game play stands out as something special). I don't want to be constantly looking at things in the game that I could see hiking through various parts of this planet, or by going to the NASA site and looking at the enhanced shots there.

I want to see an artists mind and talent in action.

I want to know that someone sat there and created something for me to see, as opposed to them sitting down and copying/scanning something from a reference book.

[cocoa-jin]

Earth itself has been through many of the classifications Trek uses for much of it's life. For example we started off as a demon planet, we were and ocean world, an ice world, even a solid rocky mass of granite, heck we even had a green sky at one stage in the past (the atmosphere was rich with iron oxide at the time), long before we came even close to a class M world we know today.

I just want to commend the level of nerdiness that you contributed here...nice...very nice.



For the realism nay-sayers...fear not realism and science. Science and realsim is frequently just as or more fanciful, exciting and intriguing as fiction.

Realsim and science based doesnt necessarily mean more work, more complicated, or harder. Dont be afraid of what science and realism can bring...it doesnt require you have a PhD to necessarily appreciate, exploit or make use of in game. In fact, relying on science and realism might make the universe and game mechanics more familiar, more intuitive.

[Arokh72]

I just want to commend the level of nerdiness that you contributed here...nice...very nice.



For the realism nay-sayers...fear not realism and science. Science and realsim is frequently just as or more fanciful, exciting and intriguing as fiction.

Realsim and science based doesnt necessarily mean more work, more complicated, or harder. Dont be afraid of what science and realism can bring...it doesnt require you have a PhD to necessarily appreciate, exploit or make use of in game. In fact, relying on science and realism might make the universe and game mechanics more familiar, more intuitive.

I have to agree with coca jin here on realism is not necessarily boring. For those that fear realism, forget the boring high school science (well it wasn't boring but you get my drift), stellar mechanics and astrophysics are quite exciting.

Besides my little realism nay sayers, if we had realism Trek wouldn't even exist in that at this point and in the 1960's when Trek was founded, having starships with Newtonian movements in a non Newtonian space was impossible. For example using even Einsteinian based realism would have the original 5 year mission returning to an earth in their perceived future and not actually 5 years on, relative to the crew that is.

On a side note it seems to me that Planet of the Apes (original) had the most accurate portrayal of relativity, in that they left earth for a little while then came back to earth far in the crew's relative future.

Now for those of you who think science is boring, especially in regard to astronomy and related fields, might I suggest you take a trip to your nearest observatory on a viewing night and take a peek at just how exciting even our local system can be. I know seeing an object rushing into the Jovian atmosphere at 8 years old changed my views forever.

[cocoa-jin]

Why? Well I'm not sure who this question is aimed at, exactly, as I haven't seen any posts asking for magic systems which have no basis in reality. What I know I was responding to earlier in the thread is the way the original post implied that most systems should look just like ours. Maybe a few extra or fewer planets, but that they should all be recognizable as solar systems based on ours. And that is far more unrealistic than anything else.

Nothing in our limited knowledge of extra-solar systems gives us the right to presume what the majority of the universe looks like. We can figure out the processes that formed our system, and gave Uranus its odd tilt, and gave Pluto its unique orbit (and by the way, cocoa, rereading the OP, Pluto was never an inner ring planet tossed out, it was always a Kuiper belt object, just like the many other Kuiper belt objects, the rocky objects beyond the gas giants). But nothing in our knowledge can tell us how normal it really is.

What is normal? Counter-clockwise orbits, 0 degree inclinations to the star? Counter-clockwise rotations? Small angle tilted axes? Well, there are several moons in retrograde, clockwise orbits, even while other moons around the same planet have prograde orbits. Pluto and Eris orbit at an inclination to the solar plane. Venus' rotation is retrograde. Uranus' axis has it rotating on its side. Even our own solar system seems to break the norms.

We only have good data on our system and our system alone. Yes we can detect extra-solar planets, but we apparently haven't finished finding the big stuff in our neck of the woods, as the discovery of Eris (aka Xena) shows us. Eris is larger than Pluto, but wasn't discovered until 2005. Why did it take so long to find? Well its orbit is at a huge inclination, 44 degrees while Pluto is only 17 degrees, and the 8 "real" planets are at 0 degrees, and it orbits much further than Pluto.

We are still learning about our own solar system and its quirks. We have good theories, good science to explain why most of it is the way it is, but nothing says its normal or common in the universe. We have a lot of theories about what could or could not happen for the rest of the universe and its many solar systems, but when it comes down to it, STO has to make stuff up because we only have really good information on one lone solar system.


Now the point I think everyone can agree on is this: STO, however it goes about designing its star systems, ought to have the clues to explain why the wilder things are the way they are, and make them seem plausible. I think everyone disagrees on what exactly is wild and what isn't though. But there is still going to be a lot of hand waving. Its science fiction, and science we really don't have a lot of data on.

Do we need an explanation for every planet in a retrograde orbit? Or for every planet rotating on its side? Or for every planet with its orbit at a high inclination angle? Do we need an explanation for rocky planets beyond the gas giants? How about every system that is not likely to be around for very long, such as planets on eventual or even imminent collision courses or a gas giant getting eaten up by its star? Some things we should just accept as the way they are. I don't see a real problem with any of those things being left as is with no further explanation offered.

Maybe this thread should focus on what should really be explained and what is just 'normal'. Something with an orbit shaped like a taco shell ought to be explained, sure, but there's so many things I have no problem just taking at face value, like habitable planets in a trinary system.

I wanst trying to imply all systems should look like ours...Ive already suggest other system arrangements most certainly not like ours. Im suggesting systems arrangment be based on the basic idea that heavier materials dominate the inner orbits and light weight materials dominate the outer rings.

Pluto's orign(if I did suggest its origin incorrectly) and subsequent placement in the solar system is a good example of the many oddities that arise from the same, basic, core guidelines that govern system development that Im trying to encourage.

I would never and did not suggest that solar systems should all spin one way or that they should all have the clockwork representation of a grade school science project model of the solar system.

Im not saying, or at least did not try to imply, that only heavy materials are in the inner orbit and only light material in the outer...their should certainly be lots of heavy materials through out the system, but is it generally in sufficent concentrations to constitute planets? I'd reckon it usually isnt.

So no, we wouldnt need arguements for every "anamoly"...especially if they appear as anamolies and not just one of many overly represented anomalies because of a sloppy randomized construction of systems.

I think its important to hold on to a standard so that the anomalies are actually anomalies.

I know seeing an object rushing into the Jovian atmosphere at 8 years old changed my views forever.

Shoemaker-Levy?

[Arokh72]

Shoemaker-Levy?

Long before then, in the early 80's actually.