Telescopes

Just wanted to put a quick thought out there, I don't have alot of time right now being at work, But
with the calendar and astronomy added to the game, are we going to see something of a useable
telescope to view the heavens?

 

Great idea!!

 

Like... the Spyglass for example?

 

Sure but something you don't really walk around and hold and just look though, but something like the steam tech look to it and a placed item for the home, and some added function. I haven't thought about it a lot yet, just thought it would be cool when I hear the word astronomy. It is still early for me but I am sure I could come up with some examples of things it could do.

 

or this?

 

I must have a telescope on my deck. Must.

 

I was thinking the same thing Mata hehe

 

I'd like it if a telescope would remove the cloud layer while in use, so you can actually see the full sky. Had to wait through a couple of nights so far just to see much in the way of stars. The planets stand out just because they are moving (far too fast, but at least it makes them easy to find).

 

Can a telescope actually remove cloud layers?

 

I'm 100% confident there will be such. LB is a fan of telescopes, astronomy, and perhaps astrology. Astrology is just the ancient magical version of astronomy, it's interesting that there are people that still believe and practice astrology to this day, it's fitting for a medieval/steampunk style game though. Large telescopes were a frequent repeating pattern in the past Ultimas. I remember watching a video of Garriott talking about Britannia Manor I or II, how it was built around the telescope. I'm sure the video is on youtube still, I couldn't find it but it was a cool interview.

 

Just as a confirmation.. Telescopes were on the asset bounty list when we were testing a new submission process. I built one but never finished texturing but I can confirm that they want a telescope, though I suspect they will probably end up building their own as it's likely to be functional.

 

The celestial mechanics concept is very cool.But the obvious follow on question about telescopes is what would one expect to see? As is, the first implementation of the heavens is a bit blurry. Celestial objects are not highly detailed. Zooming in would just make it a bigger, blurrier blob. What would one hope to see other than a large blob? One idea might be that a telescope, or a spell like night vision, allows one to not only see the stars, but to 'see' the constellations (lines connecting the stars into constellations that one doesnt see by just looking with a naked eye). Perhaps this would be useful information to understand the sky and the crafting system better.

 

I would expect it to be like the telescopes in Ultima VII, literally an "instance" of a close up, or if they are going to actually close up on the actual rotating orbiting models you're right there wouldn't be much detail. Either way it'll still be cool, and maybe they'll polish them if they plan on actually zooming up to the actual tiny models moving in the sky.

 

Every wizard has to have a telescope in his observatory! The skies are key! In fact, as I just glanced over through my open door an amazing moon met my eyes--it looks unreal it's so awesome, and forms a triangle with Venus and Jupiter (?).

Happy Solstice, my SotA comrades!

 

It's a very cool idea. Even of the functionality isn't there in every way we want, it would be a staple of any self respecting wizard's tower I would think....