Talk:Table of planet types

the water planet have a topo surface. or the earth is plagued with craters??

Read the top line on the page: "This is the planetary data as stored in the source code." SvdB might be able to elucidate a bit more since he's more familiar with the code than I. The Water worlds are similar to the telluric worlds which are also "cratered". And if you look closely at other water worlds, you do see some craters (they might be there on the earth, but the shield makes it hard to see). --Fyzixfighter 11:02, 26 August 2006 (CEST)

Ah, I see you were well intended. I will unblock your other IP address. My apologies. But the original article is correct; random water planets are generated with the "cratered" algorithm. Earth is a special case as it uses a picture of the real Earth, instead of being randomly generated. — SvdB 14:53, 26 August 2006 (CEST)

ok i'm sorry. i don't know it

Random Universe Elements?

I am curious which parts of the universe are randomly generated (probabilities are mentioned for planet generation). Some systems are obviously the same each time (like Sol), and I suspect that event (storyline) systems might be the same too. However, I obtained a map that details the approximate richness (ore value) of each system, which implies that the planet types or number of planets found in certain systems isn't highly variable. For instance, around the Orz there are (always?) a lot of Auric/Treasure worlds. Does anyone know how the planets are generated?

You might want to check the following UQM Forum thread - Planets Random or Not?. Essentially the planetary data (type, attributes, minerals, etc) is created using a pseudo-random number generator, but since the seed and the number generator's algorithm don't change, the string of numbers it produces for the planetary stuff is the same every single time you play. --Fyzixfighter 05:37, 20 December 2007 (CET)

• I am curious if there will be a way to configure the game in the future to create random planet distributions? This would be a great feature!

I'm just guessing from what Fyzix has said above - presumably by using a different (randomly generated) seed one could do this. I agree that this or something like it would be a great feature. Now, assuming that you are the same anonymous user who started this section above, you mention that the distribution of stuff isn't highly variable - this is because the randomisation is only on a small scale, so at the largest scales it all evens out. From my other life in astronomy, complete randomisation is unrealistic, let me tell you. There should be local trends in the starmap relating to the types of stars, numbers of planets, elements found and their richness, because stars grouped together have similar star formation histories and their systems have formed in similar environments.

If this sort of speculation interests you, I'm hoping to begin working on a page or pages which examine the code for things like this. I've mentioned this idea here under ``Deconstructing the UQM Source". Finally, I must warn you that if we continue speculating here, we will likely be told off because this is meant to be a discussion of the contents of the article associated with this talk page. This is what the forums (and as always, personal messages) are for. Cheers. --Zeracles 21:37, 23 December 2007 (CET)