Orbital units - 2 directions

They would also need very low turnrate and high speed. Something which puts their turning circle on the order of a planet's radius. This would strain the unit AI and be pretty hard for players to control if they can only give move orders. Forcing units to circle around the planet in the desired way sounds like a very tedious task if you are only able to give move orders.

I say this because I think units which are unable to stop and have a low turnradius will just be an annoyance which doesn't add anything. Players will just be able to set their units to move in small circles if they want them to stay around one place. The emergent game mechanics of a tight turning circle system would be quite similar to a system in which satellites can stop. The UI would just be annoying to use.

I don't agree, if you implement a mechanism forcing the satellite to continue flying in the same direction when it passes over its target you can use decent turning rates. To avoid abuse of circling over either yours or the enemies base, you could disable all weapon systems till it finishes turning. This is actually easy to explain considering the amount of energy needed to change orbit.

There shouldn't be a turnrate at all!
If you have thrusters on X and Y the sat should not turn at all they should just fire the thrusters and go in a different direction the acceleration/deacceleration should be the main point here! The reason i felt that the orbital layer was strange was because of the sat turned and banked like a airplane which ruined the immersion.
So if you think about it wouldn't it look more real if the sat movement was more realistic even if the orbits arn't?

edit:
It should almost feel like it is gliding on ice, so when you are nearing the movecommand pos the reverse thrusters should fire

My vision for orbital units, is to see units that behave in a way that feel like orbital units, in the same way as watching tanks moving across a forest feels like watching some tanks, whilst remaining within the control schemes already in the game. i.e. click to move, click to attack.

The best way to achieve this, in my humble opinion, would be to make a few aesthetic changes, the way orbital units pitch/yaw/turn so that it's a little less nimble to emulate turning in zero gravity, additionally orbital units should turn around to decelerate?
And to implement a high top speed, low acceleration/ deceleration method of movement, with the orbital fighters, assuming they remain, having the best speed and acceleration/deceleration, and the larger orbital buildings having the slowest.

Now this small change would actually require a lot of work, especially on pathing, patrols, interception etc so who knows whether this is feasible, but I think, If it were possible, that it would vastly improve the gameplay for orbital units and achieve that "feeling", that I mentioned earlier.

On a personal note, some of you fellas are being quite out of order with the insults to Uber's development team, they've been doing a great job, and you should treat them with some respect.

I still prefer orbiting units, but this is way better than the current design.
Yet the question is, is it possible to implement? They don't have much time left...

thats exactly like I've been thinking. essentially we get momentum carrying the unit forward even as its trying to go off onto a different direction. Visibly there should be counter thrusters firing as it attempts to maneuver. Gameplay wise this means that while the units will visibly react to your orders there would be a delay in carrying them out as the units try to implement new headings. Like you said "Almost like its is gliding on ice".

@schuesseled192 - I wouldn't talk about respect, schuesseled, that's going to open a whole can of worms about how people deserve to act how they act like (consequences be damned).

It's 90% art related and nothing to do with gameplay (except maybe the deacceleration)
Thursters = art related to thrusters in relation to Delta V of the unit movment
Deacceleration = art releated to thrusters in relation to the Negative Delta V of the unit movement. plus a deacceleration calculation of distance to target and thrust

The implementaion should be pretty straight forward and cheap.

The way satellites behave at this moment is quite coherent with physics if they have thrusters under them.
The satellites consume a lot of energy, a lot more than necessary for their systems (radar, etc). 10k total, lets say 4k for the radar, so 6k for energy thrusters and it's a lot of energy.

We can imagine they use their energy surplus in thrusters which enables them to have a geostationary orbit in places they wouldn't be able to do without thrusters. Look at SpaceX Grasshoper, they can make a rocket which can remain immobile in a land reference frame (i think it's the right word in English), so a hyper Advanced robotic civilization can easily do it much much better.

Video of the Grasshoper:

Also: Clarke's third law: Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

Trivial to try, but I'm not sure there is any point, does anyone actually want their units to continue moving after you've pressed stop?

Seems to me that in order to have units always moving, and hence always at risk of stumbling in range of the enemy you'd have to drastically change the UI of orbital units in order for it work. Otherwise maintaing control of your units is going to be a constant source of irritation. (Imagine if any other unit did this, say the ant)

I think it's better how it is now, without this change.

Hogswash, people don't have the right to act like prats on a public forum.

You are totaly right and it uses gimbal and gravity to move around!
I've even seen that video before.
But with the lack of thrusters that show ingame makes it look very unrealistic in my eyes even if it's just art changes to make it "make" sense.
And it would be very stupid to have a huge engine below the sat when you might as well just have directional thrusters to move it when in orbit like in real life(but more powerful ofc)

Even if you can see the rocket fire under it?

A small one should be sufficient, gravity isn't that strong in space.
Neutrino already said rockets are being implemented to launch units in space

This thread has absolutely not been a waste of time. Whereas before there was a lot of confusion and disjointed thinking on orbital, this thread has quite literally brought nearly the entire PA community together to brainstorm, debate, share ideas and focus. You now have much more community support for your own proposal and you've explained to people a lot of the 'how's and 'why's of your design. You've even tamed Nanolathe.

For something as potentially game-changing as Orbital, the size of this thread and the time devoted to discussing this with us I believe is absolutely justified. I think there is now near-unanimous support for at least trying things your way first and we have a number of alternative viable routes suggested that we could take.

Far from being a waste of time, I'd say this thread has been the most productive one in PA's short history

acually no, atleast not for a spy sat you always want to focus the "eye"/Radar down towards the planet.
Use a small rocket to take it into orbit and then just use orbit transitional thrusters to move it around it's all about art and immersion even if it is totally meaningless to the gameplay.

Does air units require, well air? Will there be celestial bodies where you won't be able to use air units because of a lacking atmoshpere? Much like naval not being accessible when there's no water. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think it might help differentiating orbital and air.

ehh, good question i think you cna use air on the moon right now... but don't know if it is oging to stay that way.

I agree completely, however mob mentality tends to prevail

Good idea. I think one of the simplest ways to differenate air and orbital is to give them different reachable areas, much like how the other layers are differenated.