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]

Originally posted by Chindraba:

...the taxi I'm designing is a needle. Width is limited to 12 and the length is expected to be in the range of 2,000+. That could keep the forward guns very busy. Especially as it's cheap on fuel to reach speeds of 300+ with ease.

I'm going to need a bit more 'testing' on my taxi's concept.

Sounds like fun! I don't think you'll collect many asteroids (or need many turrets) with the needle-shaped 12-tile wide platform though. My platforms are boring solid rectangles (mostly square) and the builds are quite compacted. So many different ways of designing platforms suited for whatever the use-case may be (narrow and super fast hauler, or very wide collector, etc).

[Hurkyl]

Originally posted by Chindraba:

Width is limited to 12 and the length is expected to be in the range of 2,000+. That could keep the forward guns very busy. Especially as it's cheap on fuel to reach speeds of 300+ with ease.

I'm going to need a bit more 'testing' on my taxi's concept.

FYI, I understand there is limited building space in the Northward direction, so if you have a 2000 tile long needle (!), the hub will need to be near the front.

[old_one_15]

Originally posted by PunCrathod:

The video I saw had a huge asteroid that had only half of its health remaining because the gun turrets at the front of the platform tried to shoot it down. And just before it hit the side of the platform it despawned. The platform had just stopped because of reaching its destination and sometimes asteroids can get a really slow speed when they spawn just as the platform is about to stop.

I've noticed this behavior coming into Nauvis orbit. As soon as speed hits 0, any small/medium asteroids will crumble to dust. What I assume is happening is that any asteroids that don't spawn in an orbit are being cleared when you enter that orbit. Was the platform in the video arriving somewhere huge asteroids don't spawn?

[Torham]

Originally posted by old_one_15:

Originally posted by PunCrathod:

The video I saw had a huge asteroid that had only half of its health remaining because the gun turrets at the front of the platform tried to shoot it down. And just before it hit the side of the platform it despawned. The platform had just stopped because of reaching its destination and sometimes asteroids can get a really slow speed when they spawn just as the platform is about to stop.

I've noticed this behavior coming into Nauvis orbit. As soon as speed hits 0, any small/medium asteroids will crumble to dust. What I assume is happening is that any asteroids that don't spawn in an orbit are being cleared when you enter that orbit. Was the platform in the video arriving somewhere huge asteroids don't spawn?

I am going to have to look at this issue in the editor, because this despawning feature can drastically alter orbital platform shape. Or someone can datamine the source code...

[Chindraba]

Originally posted by Hurkyl:

Originally posted by Chindraba:

Width is limited to 12 and the length is expected to be in the range of 2,000+. That could keep the forward guns very busy. Especially as it's cheap on fuel to reach speeds of 300+ with ease.

I'm going to need a bit more 'testing' on my taxi's concept.

FYI, I understand there is limited building space in the Northward direction, so if you have a 2000 tile long needle (!), the hub will need to be near the front.

There is, indeed, a North boundary for building. I've found it and just don't recall what it is, though it's close to 200 tiles. It is not, as I expected it to be, an even chunk size, neither from the front of the platform nor from the center point. I've put a battery of guns at the limit, have a pair of arms with collectors and then a pair of thrusters with 2 tiles of clearance before the hub itself. The 'front' looks more like a tuning fork than a needle.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3451521397

Of course, I've still some thinking and planning to do before I leave the drawing board, so the final version might not resemble anything before it.

[Lyra]

Originally posted by Chindraba:

Originally posted by Hurkyl:

FYI, I understand there is limited building space in the Northward direction, so if you have a 2000 tile long needle (!), the hub will need to be near the front.

There is, indeed, a North boundary for building. I've found it and just don't recall what it is, though it's close to 200 tiles. It is not, as I expected it to be, an even chunk size, neither from the front of the platform nor from the center point. I've put a battery of guns at the limit, have a pair of arms with collectors and then a pair of thrusters with 2 tiles of clearance before the hub itself. The 'front' looks more like a tuning fork than a needle.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3451521397

Of course, I've still some thinking and planning to do before I leave the drawing board, so the final version might not resemble anything before it.

The front limit is relative to the platform hub. Without the limit, it was possible to reach the solar system edge with no weapons and just some ablative platform on the front - since in motion, asteroids must spawn at the front.

[PunCrathod]

Originally posted by Lyra:

Originally posted by Chindraba:

There is, indeed, a North boundary for building. I've found it and just don't recall what it is, though it's close to 200 tiles. It is not, as I expected it to be, an even chunk size, neither from the front of the platform nor from the center point. I've put a battery of guns at the limit, have a pair of arms with collectors and then a pair of thrusters with 2 tiles of clearance before the hub itself. The 'front' looks more like a tuning fork than a needle.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3451521397

Of course, I've still some thinking and planning to do before I leave the drawing board, so the final version might not resemble anything before it.

The front limit is relative to the platform hub. Without the limit, it was possible to reach the solar system edge with no weapons and just some ablative platform on the front - since in motion, asteroids must spawn at the front.

It wasn't even ablative. The people who discovered the exploit just made a one tile wide stick that pushed the asteroid spawn so far north that the time it took for the asteroids to fly to the hub was longer than the travel time to the edge.

Originally posted by Torham:

Originally posted by old_one_15:

I've noticed this behavior coming into Nauvis orbit. As soon as speed hits 0, any small/medium asteroids will crumble to dust. What I assume is happening is that any asteroids that don't spawn in an orbit are being cleared when you enter that orbit. Was the platform in the video arriving somewhere huge asteroids don't spawn?

I am going to have to look at this issue in the editor, because this despawning feature can drastically alter orbital platform shape. Or someone can datamine the source code...

Please do. I don't think the despawn would be easy to datamine. I looked through the lua api and it does not mention asteroid despawning at all.

Originally posted by Chindraba:

Originally posted by Hurkyl:

FYI, I understand there is limited building space in the Northward direction, so if you have a 2000 tile long needle (!), the hub will need to be near the front.

There is, indeed, a North boundary for building. I've found it and just don't recall what it is, though it's close to 200 tiles. It is not, as I expected it to be, an even chunk size, neither from the front of the platform nor from the center point. I've put a battery of guns at the limit, have a pair of arms with collectors and then a pair of thrusters with 2 tiles of clearance before the hub itself. The 'front' looks more like a tuning fork than a needle.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3451521397

Of course, I've still some thinking and planning to do before I leave the drawing board, so the final version might not resemble anything before it.

According to data/core/prototypes/utility-constants.lua space_platform_max_size = {{-1000000, -200}, {1000000, 1000000}}
I'd assume hub is at 0,0 and down and right are positive.
You probably will want to make it a bit wider to get a couple more collectors. Even with legendary collectors they do have a pretty low throughput limit.

Also I don't know how concerned you are about ups. But according to the earlier posted sourcecode and the utility-constants.lua asteroid_spawning_offset = {{-48, -72}, {48, 48}} asteroids spawn 48 tiles further than the platform exists on both sides. So a wider(to be able to collect/destroy a larger percentage of spawned asteroids and by destroy I mean the small chunks that weren't collected hit the front of the platform. You don't want to break the bigger asteroids into multiple smaller ones if they are going to miss the platform) slower(to spawn less asteroids your collectors are not fast enough to collect) platform might be better in terms of asteroidscollected/ups. Would require testing tough.

[Torham]

OK, that was a rather fast result. And here I was already preparing spread sheets to compare shape catchment rates

Chunks do not despawn. I have made testing platform that was 1000 tiles wide and 500 tiles long ( simple T, since the top of the platform has capped max height) Than I tracked chunks that spawned at the very corner of the catchment area, the furthest possible place to spawn.

Not only they never despawned, chunks had vectors that send them flying roughly towards the central hub.
Note: I was testing stationary platform, there are definitely asteroids that can spawn that never impact the ship while moving.

Conclusion: Chunks never despawn, chunks fly towards the central hub.
The spawn rate directly correlates with the max width & length of the platform. There was A LOT of chunks peppering the central hub of the 1000x500 platform.

[Hurkyl]

Interesting. It sounds like you could chop off half of a hollow-rectangle to just use an L-shaped platform, and never have to worry about a chunk that passes through the other two sides to miss your L?

Actually, maybe just a thin line is optimal.

[Torham]

An L would work, might test it now to see if I can find a chunk that misses. But could you ever live with an asymmetrical space platform?
Thin line is not that good. Ideally you should keep the width/length ratio close to 1 to maximize spawn/platform cost. Gonna test a simple ASYMMETRICAL(rolleyes) L.

brb.
Edit: OK, new data. L has failed spectacularly, and I had to edit my previous post. There can indeed be chunks that miss. practically all the chunks that generated on the "open" side of the L had very oblique angles and were missing the plaform. The chunks seem to generate with vectors that roughly send them towards the central hub, but not directly. Moreover, the open side of the L was generating chunks only very close to the arms. it was an empty space. The closed inside of the L had chunks generate all around the inside, even as far as the far edge of the square.

[PunCrathod]

Originally posted by Torham:

Ideally you should keep the width/length ratio close to 1 to maximize spawn/platform cost.

Can you explain how you arrived to this conclusion. Because as far as the source code and math I have seen a 1999 tile wide one tile tall platform has the same width+length as a 1000 wide 1000 tall platform. If it was width*height then yes a 1:1 ratio would be optimal but because it is width+height then it does not matter.

[Torham]

Originally posted by PunCrathod:

Originally posted by Torham:

Ideally you should keep the width/length ratio close to 1 to maximize spawn/platform cost.

Can you explain how you arrived to this conclusion. Because as far as the source code and math I have seen a 1999 tile wide one tile tall platform has the same width+length as a 1000 wide 1000 tall platform. If it was width*height then yes a 1:1 ratio would be optimal but because it is width+height then it does not matter.

Suppose you are right. My bad. I was imagining the total surface area that you open with the arms, but yes you are correct, a super thin line should be the same as a + or T. just different shape. Gonna test.

Edit: Whoa that was unexpected. Seems the shape does in fact impact the vector of the chunks. A super thin 2000 tile wide platform generated a "sidewind" of chunks. Spawning at the very edges of the platform and flying parallel to the platform, never impacting. There were some impacts, but the vast majority was missing.

[Torham]

Ok did some more testing. Seems that + is the best shape overall for chunk capture. Even T was not capturing all of the chunks, with extra long arms ( over 1000 tiles each) there was a lot of them flying above the hub and missing. + with the top arm at the build cap was capturing the vast majority of the chunks flying at it. If it was very wide and not long, the vectors of the chunks were correspondingly squished, resulting in side winds that wasted a lot of the chunks. the + needs to be as close to square as possible.

And let me tell you, you can absolutely get ALL the resources even in Nauvis orbit. There seem to be no limit to the sides and bottom dimension. You could run a mega base in space, especially with the new space age buildings.

[Chindraba]

Originally posted by Torham:

And let me tell you, you can absolutely get ALL the resources even in Nauvis orbit. There seem to be no limit to the sides and bottom dimension. You could run a mega base in space, especially with the new space age buildings.

I suspect that the size limits are the same as the map of Nauvis in the base game. The limit was probably the same, exactly, until they found the need of capping the northward building. Of course, even without decorative elements and aliens, the CPU/RAM is still going to be the real limit.

Size limits, however, are likely to be the smallest of concerns when trying to build a meag-base platform. No chests, of any kind, and the limited inserter attachment space on the hub are going to present, at meag-base levels, serious issues with throughput. No bots or trains to help with long-distance transport or to "level out" flow as needed.

However, as long as the throughput limit of the hub is considered, it might be possible to make a mega-base using a fleet of platforms. You would have to use the planet, Nauvis by choice, as the transshipment point since inter-platform shipping is not available. There is, as well, the planet-locked production including the science packs, which cannot be moved to space. Still, in practical terms it could be that the meag-base is platform-centric and the planets are merely specialized outposts (and the research center for the biolabs).

[Torham]

Yeah, the chests and lack of bots really hurt. Still you could provide most of the raw materials from orbit, even for big bases.
Shame we cant send shipments across platforms, it would make a lot more sense that dumping cargo onto planet to have it send back up to different platform.