lategamer
Banded Mongoose
Dave. Can you pick up the newly printed AE35 board from the Utility Room and carry it to drone A13.
“Ccol. What else can I do?”
Return to the TV room, Dave.
Pioneer Kickstarter Preview
- Thread starter Takei
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Dave. Can you pick up the newly printed AE35 board from the Utility Room and carry it to drone A13.
“Ccol. What else can I do?”
Return to the TV room, Dave.
Sigtrygg
Emperor Mongoose
So not something you can do just by pressing a button and holding firm on the joystick...
point being without the groundside engineers that burn could not have been performed by eyeballing it...
stick a modern AI computer on board capable of making the calculations necessary in the time and you may have a chance, going all Bruce Willis not so much
cinematic vs hard science...
I am not argueing your point, John Glen only had the joystick in his pressure suit and he and the rest of the Mercury crew flew on the maths done by NASA's "Computers" before NASA got *their* edit first IBM.
But i will argue that AI today is nothing more than cinematic, some of it is funny just for being drivel. We went from 1903-12-17 to some seriously impressive planes in 37-38 years later in WW2, maybe the AI will be ready to drive by then
The further away from mission control the more the crew will need to rely on their local resources.
Not as bad for Luna, with a few seconds communication lag, but Mars can be over 20 minutes. Once you get to the outer planets, you'd better hope your onboard computer is good.
Not as bad for Luna, with a few seconds communication lag, but Mars can be over 20 minutes. Once you get to the outer planets, you'd better hope your onboard computer is good.
lategamer
Banded Mongoose
Ah, it will be.
I’d wager there are web apps that could compute trajectories these days.
The calculations probably aren't the issue, as much as the data. The mission may be more or less limited to calculating their own emephera and be relying on calculated ones for the bodies they'll be visiting. They may have limited ability to track an unexpected object.
And if an Apollo 13 situation happens on the Ceres mission, it's 15 to 30 minutes for them to tell Houston they have a problem, and another 15 to 30 minutes to get a reply. Ideally, the mission would be set to arrive when Ceres is closer to Earth than not, but the fuel usage situation may mean otherwise.
And if an Apollo 13 situation happens on the Ceres mission, it's 15 to 30 minutes for them to tell Houston they have a problem, and another 15 to 30 minutes to get a reply. Ideally, the mission would be set to arrive when Ceres is closer to Earth than not, but the fuel usage situation may mean otherwise.
lategamer
Banded Mongoose
Pick lighter astronauts and you can get all the telemetry and sensors you can handle into the flight package. We are mapping the entire world with LIDAR at the moment (because of competitive advantage reasons), if that attention moves to space there will be a surge in sensors and massive data collation.
Someone or something will have to make a decision somewhere.
Now that could be an AGI “Strap in we will be pulling up to 4G” (which reminds me of the Culture series), an expert system (dedicated flight LLM really) or left to the human pilots.
Assistive LLMs are widespread right now. (In work we’re currently specifying a massive data archive to allow instant access to a decade of data - petabytes of stuff - for image analysis - all of that will be “AI” assisted. It’s been proven to be better than humans.). Apply that to astrometrics and 30+ years of development and as others have suggested; you’d be crazy to let a human near the controls.
Yeah, this is what we are avoiding
Pioneer is based on the Traveller rules, and Traveller is all about the people, making people decisions (with people consequences).
The design principle for Pioneer is 'make players feel like they are doing orbital mechanics, without getting them to actually do orbital mechanics.'
Verisimilitude rather than simulation.
Sigtrygg
Emperor Mongoose
Not to mention highly trained versatile crew who have skill redundancy.
lategamer
Banded Mongoose
Focusing on the human aspect is fine, but for some of us in the Kickstarter it seems verisimilitude of hardware is…lacking. At least 3 of us have brought up concerns in the KS comments about the hardware detailed thus far seeming outdated/unrealistic and for a few days now have heard nothing from the developers. Except for one response about a question regarding reporting typos.
I, and I’m guessing I’m not alone, was looking for a game where we can design a space program either as a government administrator or entrepreneur, and then design the missions (a la The Case For Mars or SpaceX) and then play them out using current/near future hardware. Those are human things as well.
Yes, Traveller is about humans doing human things, but it also has robust rules systems for ‘big picture’ things like setting up merchant endeavors, running merc companies and exploration.
I understand the need to have the players feel like they’re doing something, but from what little I’ve seen of the game thus far, having multiple mechanical crises come up just so that the players have to test their skills just doesn’t seem to reflect the current state of the second aerospace renaissance.
I don’t know. I don’t want to come off negative but it’s starting to look like this may not be the game I was hoping for and it makes me sad. Unless I’m not seeing the big picture of the game, in which case I wish the development team would be more present and cheerleaderish in trying to allay our fears and sell us on the game.
I, and I’m guessing I’m not alone, was looking for a game where we can design a space program either as a government administrator or entrepreneur, and then design the missions (a la The Case For Mars or SpaceX) and then play them out using current/near future hardware. Those are human things as well.
Yes, Traveller is about humans doing human things, but it also has robust rules systems for ‘big picture’ things like setting up merchant endeavors, running merc companies and exploration.
I understand the need to have the players feel like they’re doing something, but from what little I’ve seen of the game thus far, having multiple mechanical crises come up just so that the players have to test their skills just doesn’t seem to reflect the current state of the second aerospace renaissance.
I don’t know. I don’t want to come off negative but it’s starting to look like this may not be the game I was hoping for and it makes me sad. Unless I’m not seeing the big picture of the game, in which case I wish the development team would be more present and cheerleaderish in trying to allay our fears and sell us on the game.
lategamer
Banded Mongoose
I rewrote part of the adventure for this reason (replacing the tech for a start) and I also switched out Haley Kano (Boomer Media) for Haley Kando (reality show cancer survivor). My players may be inclined to let the billionaires burn.
I also find the Boomer reference a bit weird. Surely most Boomers would be long dead by the 2050s....
Yatima
Cosmic Mongoose
The term 'Boomer' has morphed from the Baby Boomer generation (people born 1946 - 1964) to mean anyone over 30 born whenever. So an actual Baby Boomer born right at the end of that period would be 91 in 30 years time - unlikely to get off the ground. I find the whole 'hey boomer' thing is a lazy coinage, used as a pejorative that may fade as the Gen Zers themselves start to hit 30+ (starting in about 2 years time).
J
lategamer
Banded Mongoose
this is why I swapped her out.
Haley Kando is an 18-year-old reality-show phenomenon whose battle with childhood cancer made her a household name long before she reached adulthood. Millions watched as she faced surgeries, chemotherapy, and the emotional whiplash of remission with a mixture of vulnerability and fierce charm. Her prosthetic left arm and leg and the discreet pacemaker beneath her collarbone are not symbols of limitation but reminders of a life lived in defiance of the odds. With a smile brighter than the stage lights that follow her, Haley turned personal struggle into public strength, becoming an advocate for resilience, disability representation, and the stubborn, unglamorous fight to stay hopeful.
Invited aboard the FlyUp! mission as an inspirational figurehead, Haley brings a rare mix of sincerity, fame, and emotional intelligence to a crew of celebrities and executives unused to the rawness of authenticity. She is young, yes, younger than anyone else in the cabin but her lived experience gives her a gravity that belies her age. Beneath her upbeat presence lies a quiet determination to show the world, and herself, that survival is not the end of a story but the beginning of a bigger one. Her presence in orbit isn’t about branding or publicity. It’s about proving that even someone built from scars and circuitry can touch the stars.
Condottiere
Emperor Mongoose
Could be an accusation, as being an undercover robot.
Thank You Brianw.
I have only HS physics and understand only simple Transfers ie, Total mass pushed - fuel mass burnt Multipled by the Delta V = transfer orbit insertion. No RAAN, No True Anomaly, etc. Then another similiar burn to circularize your orbit for Rendezvous, proximity operations, and docking leading to more Person to Person/NPC role playing.
This, all of this! I have been a spaceflight fan since watching my first launch in '72 or '73. And a gamer since the mid-'80s. I have wasted/spent a pile of money on "Hard Science" Sci-Fi games, and am tired of the constant disappointment behind the phrase "Hard Science" - I hope I am not
disappointed.
lategamer
Banded Mongoose
I'm sure there is a massive delta between the two types of players, though. I don't want maths in the game (and my players - even though they're mostly technical people, certainly don't want to be getting out the calculator in a session).
I'm the sort of player who wants to know how many "burns" a ship has. And for most operations then how many burns would be needed.
Hohmann Transfer? That's 2 burns.
Brachistochrone Transfer (with somewhat improbable electric/nuclear as impossible for chemical rockets)? 100x? 1000x? To keep it manageable, let's say 200 burns.
Getting to a vessel or individual in distress? 1-2 burns, and 1-2 back.
Use more Burns to reduce time, that's an easy calculation.
Now, if PIONEER decides to go the "It would be handy if you were at least an intern at the JPL" method, it's not going to make me change my pledge, but I'll be damn sure that I'll be writing my own burn-based rules for handling spacecraft travel.
The issue I feel is that some people want the Math and others want an abstracted view.
(I got ChatGPT to play with numbers and calculations
Earth to Mars: With a reasonably advanced drive (Isp ~3000 s):
Hohmann:
Δv ≈ 5.6 km/s
Time ≈ 259 days
≈ 17% of initial mass is propellant
0.01 g brachistochrone:
Δv ≈ 250 km/s (~45× higher)
Time ≈ 30 days
Needs an initial mass ≈ 4000× larger to push the same payload .
It can't be that Hard or it's a delivery service for satellites. It was Neil Degrasse Tyson I watched recently saying that the US won't go to Mars unless the Chinese decide to go.
Maybe peoples should define Hard Science and how willing they are to bend the rules.
I’m not looking for a game that makes me calculate orbits or DeltaV either, but I am looking for a game that accurately depicts current SpaceX, Blue Origin, etc. hardware capabilities and extrapolates them 10-20 years into the future. Shouldn’t be that hard, SpaceX publishes their expected capabilities for Starship V3 and V4 already. Also with Zubrin’s Case for Mars, if I recall, he lists numbers for nuclear generators, the Sabatier reaction and ISRU. And those figures were from 30-40 years ago. I would hope the developers could do half a day’s online research and extrapolate to modern/near future capabilities of those items based on advances made in those technologies. Spacesuits as well. If I have to do that research to make the game what I’m looking for, then what’s the value of the game for me?
What I’m looking for is a game that provides all of those stats so that I can plug them in, rearrange them into different configurations to design a solid aerospace program and missions. That’s pretty much how Traveller does it.
I don’t even need to know how many burns it will take. Only how far (LEO, GEO, CisLunar orbits, LaGrange Points) a specific ship size will get me or how many refueling missions it will take.
And hot take, I wouldn’t take space program advice/predictions from NDT. He sits in front of a camera while others do, and he’s had some pretty bizarre takes on other subjects as well.
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