My thoughts on Starbound Ships

Anyone wonder how in hell the ships can even go from one planet to another so fast? Simple answer: "Vidgea Ghamez dun needz da logics, Duurrrr." But for fun...

Earth to mars is like 150 days (or so, quick google) in our ships, and that's if you wanna put the pedal down and burn through your fuel. Light from the sun takes like 3 min to get to mars after it passes Earth if they're closest together due to orbit. That's 670,600,000 mph! It still takes 3 minuets!

A Starbound Ship takes 5 seconds after clicking "Launch". (say, Earth to Mars, 33,900,000 miles when closest.)

(how fast is that in mph?)

HOW!? Like, I get the ships can have their own gravity so you don't plaster all over the back wall at launch, maybe they can sense incoming junk moving at ultra-mega-hyper-super-o-sonic speeds that would turn your space ship into space Swiss cheese.

But what in Gods (or Buddha, Allah, Shiva, Science, Cultivator, whatever you believe in) name do they hold together? That's some pretty epic craftsmanship there. All the welds hold, all bolts torqued properly, and the damn thing must be made up of some super-bullcrapium alloy that we could honestly be making our swords (better yet, shields and armor) out of. Or Buildings. Ammo. But the people of Starbound don't?

LOGIC.

Or they just use forcefields to protect the ship at those speeds, like saran wrap protects me from sneezing on last nights lasagna in the fridge when I'm grabbing a beer?

(For lols, I had to google Lasagna. I butchered it so bad with "Lezaniah" that even spellcheck couldn't help me.).

 

FTL drive.

FTL stands for Faster Than Light.

That is your answer.

 

HOW MUCH faster?

Nvm, answer is 24,408,000,000 mph (roughly). or 36.4x sp/light. So we could say its a 36 Lightspeed FTL Drive, give or take a few units of Lightspeed. Cause in Starbound Spaceships, that's probly just like 10 Horsepower difference in Cars by comparison.

How does the ship not kersplode?

 

1. The speed is artificially set. It is the same duration regardless of distance. And I have it removed for myself.

2. Its a game. So it doesn't really matter. Any explanation you can think of is just as valid of the next. So I will just assert that they don't break apart because they just don't.

Also, FTL refers to many different methods. Hyperspace, Warp, or simply pure speed. The former 2 are not actually "faster" than light, but are effectivly faster because they allow travel over great distances in short time periods, but not by pure speed.

 

First of all, the speed scales the further you go. It takes basically the same amount of time to travel to the system right next door as it does to travel to the far side of the galaxy. This is for playability. There's no in-game reason. It's not logical, but it doesn't matter. How fun would it be to have to wait for hours while your ship traveled the galaxy? Not fun at all. This is a game not a space ship simulator.
That being said, there could be all sorts of reasons it works like this. There are three basic types of FTL drives in fiction: jump drives, warp drives, and hyperspace drives. Currently, the method of travel in game looks like it could be either a jump drive or a hyperspace drive. It's not a warp drive because the ship travels outside of normal space and warp drive ships travel through normal space. Jump drives are the best fit, given that each trip takes about the same amount of time, but it could be hyperspace, maybe with different levels of hyperspace giving different speeds. Longer trips use higher levels of hyperspace.
So how does it not kersplode? Well, with both jump drives, the ship is never really going all that fast. Jump drives use a tunnel, the distance through the tunnel is much less than the distance through real space. Hyperspace drives use hyperspace, which is a different kind of space. It might be much more compact than real space, so one mile in hyperspace equals a light year in real space, or maybe the laws of physics work different, so there is no momentum and a ship can accelerate to whatever speed it needs to instantaneously.
Those are just a few ideas. Pick one or make up your own. It doesn't matter, because the real reason is that having your ship explode if you try to travel isn't any fun for players.

 

I realize that. I even stated it myself in my first post.

I realize that its a game. I even stated it myself in my first post.

My explanation is basically just to give an idea how fast we're talking if you did want to think of it in real-life numbers. Also, system to system travel in-game is slower than planet to planet.

And Warp-Speed makes sense, simply bending space in half like paper and stabbing a pencil through. But if your warping space, I think the developers would call it Warp Drive. Plus you see stars speeding past the ship, but no warping of space or transition through Hyperspace. Granted, it may be something living beings can't see. ((Edit: I was wrong here lol)) I believe it's pure speed, as they named it Faster Than Light Drive, whereas Lightspeed is a speed. Otherwise it would make more sense to call it Hyper Drive or Warp Drive.

Its not a matter of it being not-logical or anything, I'm just curious to see peoples thoughts. That's the point of the topic. If "it just does" was good enough and entertaining for everyone, I wouldn't be here

 

*cough* NoMansSky *cough*

Nobody likes that game.

Also "Jump Drive" sounds the most logical. And yeah, traveling system to system when the other is across the universe opposed to next to your current system makes about as much sense as a flaming bag of hammers. At least outside of Prison. I like the Jump Drives. Jump Drives are doing a good job.

Well, maybe. Does kinda still look like we're in normal space during travel.

 

Well, just flew around a bit on Starbound. My money is on Hyperdrive, I guess. Theres a flash of light, then you see stars flying by, a second flash of light, and your coming into orbit. It don't matter how far you go. Warp Drive would still have slightly different durations. However travel within systems that are planet to planet seem to just be pure speed. Makes sense, the ship could regulate the speed to be the same regardless of if you left, say, Earth to go to Mars or if you went to Uranus. Probly for safety and stuff.

 

Jump drives make sense given the animations, too. Your ship leaves orbit and gets into position for the jump, then it jumps and you get the flying stars background, the ship comes out the other side and maneuvers in normal space until it achieves orbit.

There's not standard nomenclature for fictional FTL drives, either. Under my definitions, Warp drives are like the real world theoretical "Alcubierre drive." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive It creates a bubble of warped space around the ship, and the bubble moves faster than light, taking the ship with it. The ship doesn't move at all, relative to the space around it. This is actually theoretically possible, if there is such a thing as negative energy (we don't know if there is or not.) You'd still appear to be in normal space, just inside a bubble of highly curved space-time. That's why I think it's not a warp drive, in game. But it still could be a hyperspace drive, the animations match that model pretty well. And jump drives are usually thought of as instantaneous, for the jump part anyway. If it takes time, most people consider it a hyperspace drive, not a jump drive. But why then do longer or shorter trips all take the same amount of time?

 

I'd have to say that's probly because in Hyperspace, there is only one distance to all locations? I mean, it is an alternate dimension beyond our rules of logic. Logic there may simply create one single distance between every entrance and exit in order to exist at all. Time might flow kinda funky too. This alternate space may also explain:

and

 

Well, if close enough (That is, in the same solar system, which seems to not use whatever kind of FLT drive exist in-universe since moving from planet to planet doesn't use up fuel), it could be that not only would the ships use their momentum in order to "jump" from planet to planet, but it also uses some sort of propulsion that simply doesn't exist yet. The propulsion itself seems to use energy from a renewable source (Probably solar power, considering how it can't be used between star systems)... I'd say that it most likely simply uses relatively low acceleration, but at initially high speeds.
As for being made out of "Some pretty epic craftsmanship there. All the welds hold, all bolts torqued properly, and the damn thing must be made up of some super-bullcrapium alloy that we could honestly be making our swords (better yet, shields and armor) out of. Or Buildings. Ammo. But the people of Starbound don't?", it's more likely that the structure itself is designed to withstand the acceleration by distributing the force through the whole ship, as most of the ship's background blocks can be crafted from in-universe materials (In other words, you CAN use those materials to make buildings and gear)...As for the ammo, it's difficult to even know if the guns even fire actual bullets or a different projectile that merely resembles a bullet, as, while they have infinite ammo due to the Energy system, it isn't stated if it's just a game mechanic or if there's an in-universe reason for this.

 

Bending space and pushing a pencil through it is a wormhole. Warp is using a "wave".

An FTL drive is a general name for all methods of traveling far in space because all require effective faster than light movements.

Lastly... why triple post?

 

Ah, I didn't realize the difference. That's cool. And you already stated the FTL Drive thing. I'm just trying to see witch method this particular FTL drive would most likely be using. For fun.

Lastly... I was sharing my thoughts. I was tired and forgot about the Edit button. I felt like it. There's a bunch of reasons to your rhetorical question that I feel actually means "Why are you stupid?"

Now, I don't want to start some kind of argument on here, but please don't post in a way that could be perceived as arrogant or condescending to others. I'm not saying you are, I'm saying that's the vibe I'm getting off of the way you wrote your words. Don't take this as an insult, I'm just saying how it makes me feel. If you wish to talk more, PM me.

 

It's sort of like Skyrim. You run around with a helmet made out of the strongest material out there but then some low-life bandit comes along and pierces it with his homemade arrow made of twigs. But then you put a cast iron pot on some random guys head and try to shoot through it with your arrow of penetrating-gods-behinds, and it won't go through at all.