Asteroid "spawn rate" information

[Chindraba]

I've looked at the graphs in the game for asteroid spawn rates, and in the Wiki for the spawn rates in the various orbits.

I have also built, and now un-built, a platform for making Space science packs. Just used long enough to get the basic research done for space travel and unlocking Vulcanus.

The numbers from the information compared with the processing done for science leave me wondering what the numbers relate to.

To give solid numbers to refer to, the Wiki says that Nauvis orbit has a spawn ratio of 3 metallic, 2 carbonic and 1 oxide for the asteroid chunks. It also lists a spawn percentage of 1.25 for chunks. Of course, as a safe orbit, chunks are all there is. The graph for all the Nauvis to something show the chunks as 45/m, 30/m, and 15/m for the metallic, carbonic, and oxide chunks respectively.

So, to get those quantities of chunks collected by the platform (45/m, 30/m, 15/m), how much space do I need to cover with how many collectors? (BTW, this is presuming only normal quality, 1 handed, collectors.) What is the 1.25% spawn rate referring to? Things which come to mind, and are sure not be the answer, are that there is a 1.25% chance a tile will spawn an asteroid chunk, or 1.25% of the tiles in view will spawn an asteroid chunk, or that 1.25% of the tiles in a certain range will spawn an asteroid chunk.

I'm trying to design my "taxi" platform and want it to make ammo and fuel, while being able to go as fast, or slow, as I want and I cannot 'math' the on-board production when I cannot figure out how much of the asteroids and asteroid chunks I'll have available, or have to shoot to make available.

In simple terms, WTF do these numbers relate to in a production rate sense?

[Fletch]

Hard to "math" this as your Physical Projectile Damage research level greatly amplifies the effects of your defensive turrets. You'll know you don't have enough (for your given speed), when asteroids are able to get through the defenses and crash into your travelling platform -- only options:
1. go slower (to be able to deal more damage before the asteroid impacts),
2. and/or add more turrets (yellow ammo is all that is needed on the inner planets) + more research upgrades to make the damage per second stats in your favor (overcoming asteroids base "health" before impact).

As you level up Physical Projectile Damage research, you'll burn through less and less yellow ammo on the same trips. The fuel requirements, I think you already know, is based on how "efficient" you keep the thrusters at. 100% full thrust is least fuel efficient.

[Chindraba]

Even harder to math it out when you have no clue how much fuel you can make. I might make enough fuel to go 600 or 60 based on the oxide asteroid chunk availability. How to defend against them is secondary to even know where they are. They sure didn't end up in my crushers at the advertised rate when I was stationary above Nauvis.

[Fletch]

Yep, when just sitting in orbit, the incoming rate of chunks is very low -- but should be more than enough to keep up with pretty decent space science production needs on a relatively small dedicated space science production platform. You'll get all the types of asteroids (except the special late game one) while in orbit at any inner-planet or travelling between those planets.

FWIW, if you want more collected chunks while travelling, build a wider platform. As you'll quickly see when playing around with platforms, the chunks will be coming in from the North when travelling -- you can collect a lot more chunks with a wider platform than a vertically skinny one -- but your "defense" requirements also go up as you need turret coverage to destroy those asteroids coming straight down on your wide platform.

Your initial platforms will just suck and limp along until you drastically reduce the ammo requirements with the Physical Damage Research upgrades.

EDIT: btw, once you unlock "Asteroid Reprocessing" & "Advanced Asteroid Processing" research, you'll have more options and control over things -- very similar to how Advanced Oil Processing gives a lot more freedom over the initial basic oil processing.

[Chindraba]

I've got the theory, the drag, the thrust, the production, the shooting, the width/height concepts, and all that stuff. I've even got the numbers from the Wiki and Factoriopedia. I can probably design a 50 km wide rake or a 20-tile wide needle. What I don't have is how the F do those number in the references relate to the platform's ability to 'see' asteroids? Will a 512-tile wide rake get the 45/m metallic asteroid chunks specified for Nauvis orbit? Or do I need only 100 tiles, maybe 1000 tiles?
To put it in reverse context, how many asteroid chunks would this platform collect sitting above Nauvis?
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3450679772

[Hurkyl]

If you have a specific design like that, you could always fire it up in the editor and crank the time to 64x to get a few hours worth of asteroids in a few minutes. Hopefully you can get a reasonably precise empirical measure of the rate of collection.

Minor stats note: rather than looking at the rates of the individual asteroid types, you can improve the precision a little bit by only looking at the sum of all three kinds of asteroids, and use the specified 3:2:1 ratio to break the "rate of all asteroids" estimates into the individual types.

Then, if you keep the same aspect ratio, I believe the rate of collection ought to be roughly linearly proportional to size. I don't know how confident one should be in that, though.

[kremlin]

Originally posted by Chindraba:

I've got the theory, the drag, the thrust, the production, the shooting, the width/height concepts, and all that stuff. I've even got the numbers from the Wiki and Factoriopedia. I can probably design a 50 km wide rake or a 20-tile wide needle. What I don't have is how the F do those number in the references relate to the platform's ability to 'see' asteroids? Will a 512-tile wide rake get the 45/m metallic asteroid chunks specified for Nauvis orbit? Or do I need only 100 tiles, maybe 1000 tiles?
To put it in reverse context, how many asteroid chunks would this platform collect sitting above Nauvis?
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3450679772

You're falling into the trap of way overengineering it based on theory instead of building something small that works and going from there. Start with that 20 tile wide needle and build it so it survives the trip and can idle around the other planets without being destroyed, then go from there.

[Fletch]

Originally posted by kremlin:

Originally posted by Chindraba:

I've got the theory, the drag, the thrust, the production, the shooting, the width/height concepts, and all that stuff. I've even got the numbers from the Wiki and Factoriopedia. I can probably design a 50 km wide rake or a 20-tile wide needle. What I don't have is how the F do those number in the references relate to the platform's ability to 'see' asteroids? Will a 512-tile wide rake get the 45/m metallic asteroid chunks specified for Nauvis orbit? Or do I need only 100 tiles, maybe 1000 tiles?
To put it in reverse context, how many asteroid chunks would this platform collect sitting above Nauvis?
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3450679772

You're falling into the trap of way overengineering it based on theory instead of building something small that works and going from there. Start with that 20 tile wide needle and build it so it survives the trip and can idle around the other planets without being destroyed, then go from there.

I second that. Also, @Chindraba -- those long vertical platform parts on the sides won't really help with collecting more chunks. However, that long horizontal run at the front greatly increases your collection rate when the platform is travelling.

[Hurkyl]

Originally posted by Fletch:

Originally posted by kremlin:

You're falling into the trap of way overengineering it based on theory instead of building something small that works and going from there. Start with that 20 tile wide needle and build it so it survives the trip and can idle around the other planets without being destroyed, then go from there.

I second that. Also, @Chindraba -- those long vertical platform parts on the sides won't really help with collecting more chunks. However, that long horizontal run at the front greatly increases your collection rate when the platform is travelling.

I really think the shown platform is meant for stationary orbit. So asteroids are coming from all directions, not just from the north.

[Chindraba]

As noticed by @Hurkyl, Ἐρατοσθένους is an orbital platform, not a thruster aboard. Space science pack production is its sole purpose. Observations, while slowly building the pieces showed that the North asteroids is only in transit. Stations will be hit from all sides.

The "over engineered" Ἐρατοσθένους platform was built using the 'start small and grow' principle. Limited ground-side production of parts forced a slow build-out anyway. Those vertical arms do, as a matter of fact, collect much more than an equal length of extra width did. Not 'would' from theory, rather 'did' from trial and error.

[kremlin]

Well, that's a totally different thing than the "taxi" platform mentioned in the OP.
A mobile platform a fraction of that size can be built to run continuously back and forth between planets while keeping ammo and fuel reserves topped up from the continuous asteroids on the way. Like the rest of the new challenges in Space Age a significant part of doing this effectively is to come to terms with the waste. You can use circuits to tell the collectors which asteroids you actually need, so they ignore the ones you already have too much of, or you can just toss excess right over the edge. The smaller mobile platform will be able to collect the asteroids at whatever rate you need. The benefit of Nauvis orbit is solely that it doesn't tear your ship apart while you build it, so use that to your advantage to build the platform that can continuously collect resources in motion and never run out.

[Chindraba]

Originally posted by kremlin:

Well, that's a totally different thing than the "taxi" platform mentioned in the OP.
A mobile platform a fraction of that size can be built to run continuously back and forth between planets while keeping ammo and fuel reserves topped up from the continuous asteroids on the way. Like the rest of the new challenges in Space Age a significant part of doing this effectively is to come to terms with the waste. You can use circuits to tell the collectors which asteroids you actually need, so they ignore the ones you already have too much of, or you can just toss excess right over the edge. The smaller mobile platform will be able to collect the asteroids at whatever rate you need. The benefit of Nauvis orbit is solely that it doesn't tear your ship apart while you build it, so use that to your advantage to build the platform that can continuously collect resources in motion and never run out.

The "taxi" of the OP is still on the drawing board, as it were, and will be of the needle variety since transport of the engineer, not a 'route' is the objective and cargo space or processing beyond that needed for the trip are unimportant.

The posted print is for Ἐρατοσθένους which is, or rather was, the Nauvis orbital station for making Space science. The collection of chunks there showed me that the ratio of chunks was within that given in the data. It also showed me that the 'rate', as in 45/min of metallic asteroid chunks, was in relation to something of which I cannot fathom. That is the genesis of the thread.

I already figured that 'waste' was a theme to deal with in Space Age. They've given so many ways to 'dispose' of the trash; void to space, toss into lava, recycle to oblivion, that it had to be part of the theme. The asteroid chunk ratio and the Space science pack recipe guarantees waste, either by no collecting or by tossing aside, of metallic and carbonic chunks. I added an engine plant to absorb the excess iron ore, but the carbon, at this stage of the game, is useless.

Anyway, with a stable platform it should be possible to determine how many collectors, and/or how much area of space, are needed to collect resources to produce a target level of Space science. All the numbers are given, either in the Wiki or the Factoriopedia. They just happen to lack the context to make them useful. Presumably someone has figured out, or found, the missing context.

[Hurkyl]

Originally posted by Chindraba:

but the carbon, at this stage of the game, is useless.

FWIW, Carbon has a fuel value, so you can drop it to Nauvis to toss into boilers for some extra power generation. Or fuel furnaces, if you don't switch over to electric.

Might not be worth the trouble, but it is an option.

[Chindraba]

I had the idea of doing just that, briefly. Then I looked up its fuel value. My existing boilers wouldn't be supported by a belt of carbon. Not without upgrading the belt. The map has a bit of an issue with coal, but it's not "that" bad, yet. Once I get arty coal will be no problem.

[Lyra]

Originally posted by Chindraba:

It also showed me that the 'rate', as in 45/min of metallic asteroid chunks, was in relation to something of which I cannot fathom. That is the genesis of the thread.

I still also have this issue, and hope to find an answer somewhere as well. "45/minute" is obviously not an exactly correct figure, given that asteroid rate is also based on platform speed. So at what speed is "45/minute" calibrated for? I have not found this out despite beating the game with the DLC.

[knighttemplar1960]

Originally posted by Chindraba:

I had the idea of doing just that, briefly. Then I looked up its fuel value. My existing boilers wouldn't be supported by a belt of carbon. Not without upgrading the belt. The map has a bit of an issue with coal, but it's not "that" bad, yet. Once I get arty coal will be no problem.

If you absolutely have to you can rob some coal from Vulcanus. Your first coal patch there should be in the start area.