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AstroSynthesis 3.0
Along the lines of Mark's FM9 thread... what sorts of things do you want to see in a AstroSynthesis 3.0.
The major plans right now are to migrate the file format to a real database format. Also, to update the system generator and some of the graphs.
What other functionality would you like to see in an AS3?
The major plans right now are to migrate the file format to a real database format. Also, to update the system generator and some of the graphs.
What other functionality would you like to see in an AS3?
Comments
1. Change the Sector Report Output so that it shows all the time. Right now I'm having a problem with maps not showing. They show up in the program, but not in the HTML that is created. I don't know if this is my computer or not.
2. Change the location of the default files. I am running VISTA Home Edition and it doesn't allow files to be saved in the program directory. I have to manually change the directory when saving Sector files, but the browser opens up in the default location. Of course, there are no files there!
3. Allow me to specify the default settings for colors for non-populated planets. Also possibly adding a different type of color generation for gas giants indicating the bands. I want some of my gas giants to have bands, but I get a blend of colors instead of bands. How hard would it be to allow three different colors based on the atmosphere? Also, I get some weird color combination's when generating maps for terrestrial planets with no atmosphere. I like the impact craters.
4. Speaking of which... Can you add some way to create impact craters in Fractal Terrains? The ability to add something like this in a large map would look cool.
5. Maybe merge some of the Astro-script files into the main program. Quick Generate is a good one, as is keep habitable.
All in all, this is an awesome program. I am working on the map for the Battletech game. Some of the planetary systems are detailed, while there is nothing on others. So I get decent information on some (probably 50-75 out of 300). The rest I have to fill in.
This has got my geek juices flowing!
2) There are problems when importing csv files to add to a universe. Despite having an option to avoid duplication of systems it never works and always duplicates.
3) Better planetary generator. For example, Celestia has a link to StarGen which is far more realistic. There are a variety of planetary generators and forumulae available to improve upon the current generator. As part of this, when you add a planet to a system manually it would be useful if the data for orbits and eccentricity were calculated automatically. This comes into play even more if you are adding moons to a planet. You need to do alot of manual work when it shold be easy for the program to calculate orbits that don't crash into each other or crash into the planet.
4) The ability to create sectors that don't have to be square. For example, if you create a spherical grid you are forced to create square sectors so these sectors don't cleanly fit into the overall universe.
5) When I make routes between planets it is a bit cumbersome. It would be nice to have an interface whereby I could select a planet and it would display systems/planets within a certain range and I could click on the various routes between the various planets. It is incredibly time consuming unless I want the program to completely automate.
6) Less extraneous space stations created when it generates system contents or at least an option to reduce them. It makes more sense in some cases to have the program generate spacestations between star systems as layovers.
7) Why aren't black holes generated or shown on the map.
Are you considering using a standard like mySQL or Access? I'm not sure what the legal ramifications are, but it would be great to have something that could be imported into Access to work with it. I would love to see it in a SQL database to make it easy to publish player data onto live web pages through a simple ASP.
Just my two cents worth. BTW, I love Astrosynthesis. I had been using Astrologicus and Terralogicus but since the parent company went out of business, I could not longer get support for these....and they were DOS based which caused other technical difficulties. Thanks for bringing out such great products!
I dont think it will require uniqueness in system's names - I wouldnt want to enforce that because there's legitimate reasons why systems might have duplicate names (ie, think of how many Springfields there are). But each system will have a unique database ID and also the UABI string thats associated with every body.
I dont know how easy that would be to do but being able to make a custom field which directly manipulates data from another data field source, i.e making a custom field (Distance(miles)) which takes the AU information from Distance(AU) and allows you to multiply it in order to show miles in its custom field. I hope that made sense
The ability to format what fields show up in the search window results.
Multiple star systems - A more realistic format, having the stars as either true companions occupying orbital locations or as close objects - with individual x,y,z coordinates.
The ability to select multiple selections in the search window, out of order, i.e. ctrl-select rather than just shift-select.
The ability to specifically place sub-sector names as well as the center point.
I am sure i will find more to add later....
shadowdragon
Btw: is there a time frame for Astrov3.0 or is it still in the research phase?
I would like Astro to keep time properly so the GM can advance, stop/pause, and reverse time in the galaxy. Also able to type in a "time" and be able to see the system planet locations.
I found this would be a vital addition as I replicated the Solar System for my own game.
I know it would likely be a real Challenger to calculate travel distances with the moving objects and perhaps some GM might want to have this "time" as an option.
Another idea:
Perhaps a point to point distance calculator on the 3D system viewer (for space-battles)
EDIT: Ooo, I could work on some poly-"lite" 3D models if you are going to improve the 3D displays.
I can certainly see if I can find some model-loading libraries for 3d ships and such ;-)
Yeah, one of the problems I was having was in the case of seasonal events in one game. Also in re-creating the solar system, I had set the orbital positions in my system to 2012 (also aligned a asteroid collision with Apophis in 2036) The problem with the game sessions was "running the clock" to the current game session time... if there was (as we call in animation) a "scrubber" or an input to advance the planetary positions to the game time to where you want it to be. Hours, days, months or years.
An auto set would be good too as an option, but I'd see using the GM's input + or - (for those time travelers out there) would be the most useful in the case for using the same space setting for multiple gaming groups/parties.
That would be awesome, it would be nice to see satellites, rockets, space-stations, battle-fleets roaming the 3D systems. I could see a whole new community developing out of this request.
A few of the ideas I have are:
Interface and Display
When selecting a body from the search window it should drill down to that actual body in the system data tree and not just the system. This can be bothersome in a multiple star system because then you have to go through each star/planet/moon etc to find the actual body you are looking for unless you have the default naming scheme (I, II, IV, etc for planets, .1, .2 for moons, etc), then it makes it a little easier to find it.
As a side note to that, maybe have two separate fields, one for the bodies designation and one for it's name. Depending on where you want to put the load the designation could be stored, thus adding to file size, and updating it dynamically when new bodies are added, the systems name changes, etc. Or generating it on the fly, thus chewing up more cycles, when a system is selected.
Smaller Bodies probably don't need to be displayed in the dropdown list in the Travel Time Calculator as it really doesn't make sense.
Asteroid Belts could have something similar to the Atmosphere Components for Planets/Moons that show the percentage of of different asteroid classifications that comprise the asteroid belt. C-Type, S-Type, and M-Type would probably be suitable for most peoples purposes but it would probably be good to give it the same number of rows as atmosphere composition in case someone wants to go more in-depth with Tholen or SMASS classification.
On the System Diagram have Asteroid Belts display as thick bands similar to how Rings on a Plants are displayed. Maybe not as a solid band but perhaps as a polka dot or hatched pattern to show the general area covered by the Asteroid Belt.
Multiple Spheres of Influence. The Federation of Do Gooders has three main branches; Space Boy Scouts who sell Space Popcorn, Space Girl Guides who sell Space Cookies, and Space Little Leagues who sell Space Raffle Tickets. Piggy Puff III is the centre of operations for the FDG in the Couch Potato Nebula. Booming sales of Space Carmel Space Popcorn and Tipple Stuffed Space Chocolate Space Cookies have allowed the Space Boy Scouts and Space Girl Guides to purchase and maintain a fleet of Space Buses to transport them to their Space Camping Trips and Space Community Service Events anywhere in the Couch Potato Nebula. Unfortunately poor sale of Space Raffle Tickets with a grand prize of a Space Home Gym and Space Personal Trainer have left the Space Little Leagues with only a few volunteer Space Moms driving Space Chevy Astro Vans and Space Ford Windstars to a few neighbouring systems to play Space Soccer and Space Baseball. Reports say the Space Boy Scouts and Space Girl Guides are not doing so well in the Diabetic Cluster.
Multiple Political Affiliations for basically the same reasons as multiple spheres of influence; being part of different pacts, trade agreements, alliances etc.
Placing stationary objects in a system. What I mean is objects that don't have an orbit, kinda setting specific, but maybe if you had jump points that didn't move thus travel to them would take more/less time depending on on your place of departure and where it was in it's orbit. I remember someone mentioning the idea of not having separate views for the sector/systems/bodies it all just depended on your level of zoom (I really like this idea by the way), if that was implemented then it really wouldn't be an issue because you could just place the Marker or whatever as a separate body and not a child of another body.
Plugins and API
Support for subfolders in the plugins folder. It would be handy for things like my GURPS Suite to be able to reside lumped togeather in their own folder in the plugins folder.
Being able to create sub menus in the Plugins and Popmenu menus. I have plans to add more features to my GURPS Suite but it's starting to get a little cluttered in the menus. It would be nice if I could create a sub menu for them like how Subsectors work in the Filters menu or Change Body Type works in the popmenu, then I could have GURPS Suite > {list of plugins}.
Easier management of System Data Config Class. Unfortunately I'm not sure what the best way to go about doing this would be. Currently I think my GURPS plugins and the old one written by Robert Crawford are the only ones that change the System Data Config but I don't really like the idea of my plugins clobbering changes made by somebody else's or vice versa. Although the data isn't harmed if more plugins start to do it it would be a very annoying and possibly deal breaking experience for a user that is constantly getting the data display modified by multiple plugins every time they are run and having to go in an manually re-add fields to be displayed each time.
Custom Filters. 'Nuff said.
Being able to refresh the system data tree from the API.
Being able to more gracefully deselect all currently selected bodies. In my Plot Jump Route plugin I had to use this kludge It works, but I don't know if it's really suppose to work that way.
A Listbox Widget that supports multiple selection via the shift and control keys would be nice. In fact it would be nice to create more robust GUI's over all. Being able to preform event handling like OnChange for dropdown lists for example. I don't know if maybe HTA's may be a better way to go then just VBScript because it would allow for a lot more freedom in building and scripting the GUI, but I'm not sure how difficult it would to hook it into the AS API.
Those are what I can think of right now. I probably have more for the API but can't think of them right now.
Best Regards,
Alan Bartholet
Adding #version to the command tags and making it a column in the Plug-Ins tab in the Program Preferences, or wherever the AS3 equivalent would be. I think this would be a clean and easy way for users to find out what version of a script they are running without having to dig it out of the plugin file (if the author put it there) or requiring the author to put it somewhere in the name or description.
Best Regards,
Alan Bartholet
I'm glad to see you are working toward a real database in AS3. An ODBC compliant one would be really great!!!!
If we could attach tables and change data from like say, MsAccess 2007 to manipulate the coordinates of ships and stuff based on data related to other games in progress that would be awesome.
Erasmus
Configurable based upon the Star and also separate references for each planet. Parameters could include units of measure and be scaled to the overall galactic units.
Stationary Object:(as mentioned by another)
These would allow establishment of Warp Point (or other types) objects in stationary locations at 3D coordinates within the system (relative to the Star at a local scale). These stationary objects could have a parameter to link to a reciprocal location in deep space or another star system, etc. (Think Starfire) Additional customizable parameters could be included for use by a linked database tool.
Surface Colonies, Orbital Structures and Ships:
These would be either attached to a planet surface location, in orbit around a planet or moon, OR maneuvering within the local 3D reference via manipulation of those parameters via a linked database tool. Using default selection of icons and customizable blazon type 3D models as an option. Attitude parameter for proper "facing" of the object should be included as well as custom fields.
I would prefer MS Access compliance in some way using ODBC, etc.
I second this. I would also like to see:
Routes searchable by name or length or type, even by the display properties.
A built in route generator that works similar to the Jump Route Plugin. It's only drawback I can see is that it only allows 10 ly jumps for the maximum (I think that's a Traveller-specific thing).
Populations generate more intelligently.
An option to use Imperial, Metric or custom units and to display alternate distances like AU, RE, etc.
More control over sector reports, like only selected or populated systems, or systems within X distance of selected systems or along a route. Even a report that only shows the populated system. I'd like to see subsectors reported in sector reports, too.
Labels on printed maps should never overlap. X,Y, and Z shown on prints, not just the 3rd dimension (based on print axis).
Export to csv as standard, choosing fields to export.
Custom filters.
Larger print preview images.
In the old Star Wars game by West End, there was a matrix of systems with distances to every other system. Something like that would help in determining routes without having to pan around the map or search.
Ctrl-clickabitlity.
Irregular sector and sub-sector support.
Night sky views from specific planets, maybe just in the export as image dialog.
Political boundaries, similar to subsectors.
a default image for each planet type, instead of "no surface map" It should be substituted by an actual surface map if one has been created, but a placeholder would be nice.
I'm sure I'd like to see more, I just can't think of anything else right now.
Goodnight space travellers.
You've already had these suggestions but I'm just putting in my vote as well
The only thing I don't think I saw a suggestion for, was I can't figure out a way to use the travel calculator to calculate the travel time between stars. Purhaps there's already a way to do that, but for me, I was trying to highlight the two systems in question and then open the travel calculator and it wouldn't give me the source/destination.
Oh, also for asteroid belts. I saw that I could set the orbital distance, and then set how wide the field was, but after I set all that and go to the system view, it still shows the asteroid belt as just a single orbital line and not something representing a large range of orbits.
You cant, because every game and literary universe has their own method/rules for FTL and interstellar travel. This is something better left to a plugin for a specific rule set.
The list that drops down only goes up to 10 but you are also able to enter your own value in the box.
Best Regards,
Alan Bartholet
Nice, I'm looking forward to what you have in the next version. I've been learning as much as I can and have been really liking this.
I originally picked up astro because of a scifi game I was running that I've recently gotten back into.
The main difficulty that has kept me from using astro more than I have is that astro seems to specialize in creating large random swaths populated by hundreds or more stars/star systems. Whereas, the game I'm using only requires a handful of premade solar systems. I've tried to use astro to make models of the solar systems, which is fairly straight forward process. However, the models don't make particularly compelling maps. In the end, I've felt as though astro is basically too powerful for my application and that I'd be better off using fractal mapper to make a set of 2D solar system maps that look good and can be printed out and given to my players as a reference. This disadvantage of using fractal mapper to make 2D maps is that the planets don't move around a star.
A feature that I'd really like to see in astro 3.0 would be a straight forward way to print a solar system on a hex map. Ideally there would be a setting that would let one magnify the size of planetary bodies so the map is visually appealing, rather than a bunch of concentric circles with tiny dots representing the planets. This type of functionality would make astro 3.0 well worth the investment for people in my situation. Basically letting me make a visually appealing 2D map that changes with time.
Along these lines, I've also tried to make an asteroid field (opposed to a belt) that could orbit a star. So far, I haven't found a compelling way to do this in the current version of the program. All the body types I've tried basically get represented as point sources, rather than having a substantial thickness.
The other feature I've wanted, which I think you've already mentioned, is an improved surface map generator for gas giants.
Finally, thought. I've recently been reading up on binary star systems. Do you have any intention to let us set the distance binary stars orbit around each other?
Or is there a sanity check option I'm just missing?
(EDIT to clarify: I know stellar type is not a direct function of mass, but it seems to me there should be a "sanity range" that the GM can override if he needs to.)
I've enjoyed using Astrosythesis 2, but also found it very frustrating in places. There are a few key features I'd like to see in a version 3.
Stellar frequency
- An ability to get a randomly generated distribution of stars much more thinly distributed than is currently possible. With the programmes current parameters, the sparsest possible random sector is near the maximum plausible density for space around Sol. It would be good if the middle of the density slider was roughly where the bottom is now, and the bottom of Astroysynthesis 3 allowed for very sparse distributions of stars and other bodies.
- An ability to switch on a realistic distribution of stellar types so that a medium sized random star sector doesn't turn up with multiple neutron stars or bright supergiants or other rare stars. It would be good to have this as an option so that those who want a more space-opera feel with a black hole or othe rare object in every second sector could switch that on.
Most important
An ability to get astrosynthesis to generate systems automativally for an imported list of stars while keeping the star's names. Currently the generate contents and keep name plug in does this for one star at a time, but you can't do this for say, the Gliese catalogue as a whole after importing it to Astrosynthesis.
It would also be useful if one could switch the naming function off so that the names of all new bodies generated defaulted to [Star Name] - I, II etc.
Cheers,
Conal
The ability to alter the distribution of different types of bodies is already in 3.0 (see above).
There's the CSV and XML importers, so those should do the trick for importing lists.
For generating systems once that data is in, thats really what the plugin API is for. Modify that 'generate contents' plugin to do its thing with each star on the map.
You can do this now in 2.0. Make an IPad table that just spits out generic names. That may even be built into 2.0 now... there might be an option for the generic names only in the New Sector window. I forget if that was shipped with AS2 or not.
Both the gas giant and terrestrial maps have been improved... and greatly speeded up. The maps are all made in real time, so you dont have to choose 'create surface map' every time you want to see one. They are all generated on the fly automatically as needed. Even in the orbital display. It'll even use multiple processors for creating them.
Yes, kind of. Not distance, but rather it lets you specify an x/y/z around a central point of the system. That gets a little complicated when you have close multiples within far multiples, but it lets the system display (which is sort of like the solar system display, but for multiple star systems) show their relative positions.
Probably the wrong forum for this since its about scripting - but I'll ask here anyway.
The problem isn't importing a list of stars via CSV (done easily). It's persuading Astrosynthesis to go through each star system and update the contents (while keeping the original system name). The 'generate contents' plug in is excellent for showing how to create and generate new systems, but the code required to both go through each existing system in the sector and generate new contents while keeping the original system name is a bit beyond me.
Cheers,
De Coucy
In what ways have the map generators been improved? Are they more randomized?