Drag and artillery

Apologies in advance if a topic like this has already been placed
So I was wondering about how the artillery would work in PA and then I thought..
Why not add a basic form of drag to the Artillery round?
I am not sure how this would work technically but I can envision it as;
Planets with large atmospheres have more drag on the artillery rounds making the artillery fire at shorter distances
Planets with medium or small atmospheres have the rounds encounter drag at a decreased intensity so the round fires at mid to mid long ranges
And then there are planets, moons and asteroids with no atmospheres at all so only gravity would affect the round so the artillery round could fire massive, even AWESOME distances, maybe even out of the planet's orbit.
So depending on the planet, artillery can fire like a balloon with rocket engines or a giant block of lead with elephants.
Again I don't even know if this is even possible on a technical standpoint since I have no programming knowledge, but I would be kinda cool.

Nope, Give Arty a Range and that's that, considering how planets don't come in set sizes(or rather there are lots of sizes depending how you look at it) trying to figure it out off hand or memorize it would not be fun in the slightest.

Mike

The poll is a little confusing...

"Would you have it on or off?"

"Yes"

"No"

That's not really a valid set of answers. That's like being asked "Do you want to eat a burger or a pizza?" and replying "Yes".

Easier said than done. If a planet doesn't have enough gravity, every shell could find itself shooting into space!

That's a situation where Gameplay trumps realism for me, but that's a discussion for a different thread.

Also the drag idea is also very arbitrary, affecting only only arty when it should effect all projectiles and air units, but see my previous point about confusion and trying to remeber all the different stat values.

Mike

@causeless

Those answers are perfectly valid from them point of view of logic.
'Do you want X or Y':
- yes means that you want X or Y (you don't say which actually -- in your example, it says you want burger or pizza and not an apple or something else)
- no means the opposite -- you want neither burger nor pizza; a bit tricky to interpret in case of the question in the poll. Quantum mechanical projectiles or something (both affected and not affected by planet's gravity)?

Then in that case I understand why It wouldn't be fun....its a technical nightmare and its annoying for the player.

The problem would be seeing how different atmospheres would affect your shells.

Gravity isn't hard because its just based on size, and so is easy to read, but atmospheres are mostly see through, so how would you determine it's effect?

Well yes on a earth like planet the atmosphere is quite transparent
but then look at something like a gas giant and its obvious it has a atmosphere.
I hope this clears that up( somehow..)

From a gameplay perspective the gas of a gas giant would appear to be more like the terrain on a earth type planet.

I just don't feel like it should be something that is important over say, gravity affecting the range of weapons.

It wouldn't really be worth the effort to put into the game.

Atmospheric effects on a typical world aren't very important. It might reduce the accuracy of artillery shells, but that's pretty much a world modifier more than anything else.

Atmospheric effects on a gas giant tend to be more important.

Now that I look back on it..yeah, drag is not worth it.....
Also I still think you can't really land on a gas giant because there is no terrain on a gas giant(either that or it would be really weird) ....from what we know of Jupiter so far at the least.
But then again this is my first forum post so I have no idea what I am doing <_<

I suppose so because as so far as we know of jupiter we sort of know that gas giants are one big atmosphere, so im somewhat baffled at what the developers of PA will do with gas giants, air exclusive? orbit exclusive? we don't know until whenever they decide the information can be released about it.

and yeah Other planet atmospheres probably won't do much.

That's ok, you still have not beaten my record for most stupid idea.

And as for gas giant terrain, I mean more like avoiding going further down, where the mega storms go around.

Drag is pretty pointless. All it does is make the gun aim a little higher. If the drag is sufficient to reduce range a lot then you can do the exact same thing by reducing the range with through balancing.

This makes me curious... What is the record for most stupid idea?

Suggesting we remove the mushroom cloud from nukes.

More physics?
Yes, please!
Lasers dispersing more in atmosphere, smoke and clouds of debris?
Yes, please!
Gravity affecting projectile ranges?
Yes, please!
Inertia effecting unit turn rate and turret turn rate?
Yes, please!
Atmospheric pressure affecting aerodynamics?
Yes, please!
Ballistic drop off caused by aerodynamics?
Sure!
Ballistic drop off causing different penetration?
Glad to have it!
Armor penetration?
It is fun!
Artillery having shorter range in dense atmosphere?
Err... Ok. Never thought of that one.
General relativity?
Wut? How does it affect gameplay???
String theory?
I don't know string theory.

Relativity cant be simulated, unless we actually use realistic distances between everything. That would be a massive shift in the gameplay mechanics.

Not if it is too small to be noticed.