Space Engineers

Space Engineers

Real Solar Systems
 This topic has been pinned, so it's probably important
Echthros  [developer] 18 Oct, 2024 @ 9:07pm
How It Works
Voxels and Proxies
Voxels can't move. The engine doesn't like it very much if you try. So instead, the real planets are spawned many hundreds of thousands of km from the center and fake proxy planets will move around in their stead. When you approach one of the proxies, you will teleport "seamlessly" to the real planet and can land on it from there.

Zone Transition
The velocity of entities will be changed to match the coordinate system of the new zone. For instance, if you are standing still in space and a planet orbits into you, you will suddenly be travelling towards it at the same speed it was orbiting. This can be dangerous if you aren't careful!

There is also a distinction between the "ORBIT" and "SURFACE" zones for planets. In the ORBIT zone, you will follow the planet along its orbit while the planet spins beneath you. In the SURFACE zone, you will follow the planet's surface while the sky and stars spin around you. When you are not near enough to any planet to be within its zone, you will be in the PROXY zone, which is the default zone that doesn't move.

When entities transition between zones, all entities nearby will transition with them. In theory everything is offset the exact same amount during the teleport, but in practice it isn't always perfectly clean (especially in MP). This can be potentially hazardous if you are walking around inside of your ship or are dampened to it. For safety, you may want all players to remain seated when transitioning between zones.

Proxy Scale
In addition to the orbit and day cycle customization, you can also set the Proxy Scale of a planet. This will make the planet larger or smaller in proxy space without changing the size of the actual voxel planet. This can allow for life-size planets in proxy space without breaking the engine with an oversized voxel planet. You could also make the planets much smaller and closer together in proxy space to make interplanetary travel much easier if you prefer (all distances between planets in proxy space will be smaller).

GPS
GPSs are managed so that they appear to be moving with whatever zone they are placed in. So if you place one at your base on the surface of a planet and then go into space, you'll see that GPS moving along with the planet. This is accomplished by making a duplicate GPS for every one you place to act as a proxy that will be moved around the world to match where you would expect it to be. You can see these in your GPS list marked with "PROXY_DO_NOT_EDIT" in the description. If you want to remove or edit the GPS, make your changes to the original, not the copy (or the changes will just be overwritten).

Speed Limits
The SE engine has a tendency to break down in various ways when travelling at uncapped speeds, but there are ways to avoid the worst of them, so here are a couple pointers:

1. (speed > 1000 m/s) Moving around as a player inside a ship at these speeds is very difficult and may see you clip outside the ship or get splattered.
2. (speed > 10,000 m/s) Ships with subgrids may generate collisions between their subgrids that take a very long time for the engine to process. The game may freeze for several minutes if this happens, so avoid using any subgrids (or keep them locked so that they don't move around) if you want to go any faster than this.
3. (speed > 150,000 m/s) Any grids that travel faster than this may have their velocity glitch out and get stuck moving at 800,000 -1,000,000 m/s. This can be fixed by finding the grid in the entity list and Stopping the grid several times.

So in summary, if you want to explore the solar system at extreme speeds: stay in a cockpit at all times, avoid using any subgrids, and set the global speed limit < 150,000 m/s. Enjoy!
Last edited by Echthros; 22 Oct, 2024 @ 11:28pm
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Showing 1-15 of 18 comments
Hermann 22 Oct, 2024 @ 8:07am 
Wow, this is really clever. Thank you!
Kai 22 Oct, 2024 @ 4:24pm 
Does the mod handle GPS signals at all? If I create a gps marker on a planet surface will it move with the planet when I leave or will the marker appear where the real planet is?
Absolarix 22 Oct, 2024 @ 8:21pm 
Wow. Very clever, well done! I look forward to giving this a try!
Echthros  [developer] 22 Oct, 2024 @ 11:28pm 
@Kai GPSs are handled so that they appear to move with planets. I added a section in the post above.
Rewl 23 Oct, 2024 @ 12:47am 
hehe....Proxy orbits will be cleaned by proxy if bases are build there ;)
Chad The Menace 23 Oct, 2024 @ 11:43pm 
so does it just look like it's moving or is it really moving, also do you see them moving in space or is that the proxy zone and everything is static, what about multiplayer?
GammaGam3s 24 Oct, 2024 @ 7:14am 
I make a GPS location but the PROXY_DO_NOT_EDIT Variant of the gps appears at 19.26ls?
I'm not overly sure if i've done something wrong or what is happening
Ammorok 28 Oct, 2024 @ 8:09am 
Great addition to my game, good learning curve to set up. Will you eventually develop a white paper outlining all of the features in an itemized list?
Quartofel 28 Oct, 2024 @ 2:44pm 
Amazing
Draxis 28 Oct, 2024 @ 9:14pm 
Will MES AI (And AI in general) be capable of functioning in this environment? (The kind that spawn around players within 5-15 km, with encounters most likely occurring within the "Orbit" zone)
Danman1354 5 Nov, 2024 @ 10:19am 
How do other planets and moon appear from the surface of one planet? Do they appear to move?
Nirahiel 7 Nov, 2024 @ 9:12am 
What about GPS positions for scripts ? If I have a script controlling a ship trying to move that ship to a specific coordinate in space, what will happen if that point is inside the SoI of a planet ?
GavrOs 16 Nov, 2024 @ 12:30pm 
Hi! It is not very clear how to adjust the inclination of the orbit. You did this using pitch, roll, and yaw angles. Where to look for these corners? In Wikipedia, there is only the angle of deviation from the plane of the ecliptic/equator of the Sun/invariant plane, or the angle of the argument of the pericenter and the longitude of the ascending node. And how to set the eccentricity of the orbit?
VOID 2 Dec, 2024 @ 8:50am 
Question: Is it possible to use remote controlled drones normally? Or does the change from planet to proxy mean they will go out of range of antennas, or cause a massive power spike for laser antennas?
How about A.I. navigation? How do A.I: blocks and scripts handle the zone change?
Love this mod but we are having an issue that may be on my end. We are all getting redundant GPS markers for everything that makes one like planets, our respawn pods, signals and the /gps command. If we delete them they come back and keep repeating. Is there something I didn't do correctly when I created the game?

https://imgur.com/iApDjcP
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Showing 1-15 of 18 comments
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