City Lights Experiment

[StubbyEE]

I've been a forum lurker for some time now, and I have decided to make my first post. The topic of getting city lights on random planets has interested me, and I've carried out an experiment to figure out the real conditions for a planet with city lights to appear.

To begin the experiment, I started a new simulation. I placed the Sun in the center, and surrounded it with 100 random rocky planets (while on pause). All of the rocky planets were in the center of the green area in the habitable zone.
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RESULTS:

After checking every planet, 7/100 had city lights. I deleted the rest of the planets without lights.

The masses of the lighted planets ranged from 0.40 Earths to 2.72 Earths.

The radii ranged from 4642km to 8125km.

The materials ranged from 2.88% iron/97.1% silicate, to 95% iron/5% silicate.

The atmospheric densities ranged from 0.715atm, to 1.99atm. Every atmosphere was bluish.

The temperatures do not seem to matter, they ranged from -34.5 to -17.8.

Curiously, none of the planets had any water. All were 0%.
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IMAGES:

All 100 planets around the Sun.
http://i.imgur.com/CkRXzks.png

The 7 planets with city lights after deleting the other planets.
http://i.imgur.com/dQoWjMW.png

A view of all 7 planets from the nightside, all with city lights.
http://i.imgur.com/Pv50We6.jpg

A closeup of the city lights on one planet. They are just tiny glowing dots.
http://i.imgur.com/ubT01FZ.png

A view of all 7 waterless surfaces.
http://i.imgur.com/1XdJclP.jpg
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Unfortunately, city lights are not persistent through saves, so saving the simulation and reloading it will remove the city lights. Deleting a lighted planet and bringing it back with Ctrl-Z will also remove city lights. Saving objects to place again will not save city lights either. Adding water will cover some/all lights, but will not remove them.

I will do more tests sooner or later, testing more conditions, such as the kind of stars required, and effects of impacts.

[codefantastic]

I think the devs may have started working on city lights and there's a code somewhere in the game that's supposed to be disabled but is bugged at the moment.

[Physics_Hacker]

^ or maybe it's some sort of conspiracy? XD

[codefantastic]

^ or maybe it's some sort of conspiracy? XD

*puts tinfoil hat on*

[The Ventifact]

I think the devs may have started working on city lights and there's a code somewhere in the game that's supposed to be disabled but is bugged at the moment.

The city lights go as far back as Closed Alpha 7 or 8. I think I remember a while back one of the devs saying it was a bug and not meant to be in there. The devs have talked about doing city lights on habitable planets, but have not finalized on how to do it. Personally, I've never had it happen, and I've been around since Alpha 8.

Must be a hit or miss.

[codefantastic]

Alright so I repeated the experiment with 35 (I would have done 100 planets but was in a rush) planets sharing the same orbit.
I found 3 planets out of the 35 so in my case the chance of spawning city lights was about 11.6%
All pictures are below, I hope more people repeat the experiment!
Stars Info:
Mass- 996 Jupiters
Radius- 596,833 (about .800 suns)
Planets info:
Each had a radius greater than Earth's but less than 1.5 Earth's
Each was dry and had blue atmospheres
I have additional pictures but the limit is 4 attachments

[codefantastic]

Alright so I repeated the experiment with 35 planets sharing the same orbit.
I found 3 planets out of the 35 so in my case the chance of spawning city lights was about 11.6%
All pictures are below, I hope more people repeat the experiment!
Stars Info:
Mass- 996 Jupiters
Radius- 596,833 (about .800 suns)
Planets info:
Each had a radius greater than Earth's but less than 1.5 Earth's
Each was dry and had blue atmospheres
I have additional pictures but the limit is 4 attachments

Here's the third planets lights

[FiahOwl]

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[codefantastic]

Mmm... weird, Guess I calculated it wrong.

[CarpetCreatures]

I can save planets with city lights. When I'm going to place a planet the city lights are there before I place it but after I place the planet they go away. To fix this, pause the simulation before placing the planet and then set the temp to 15C. It works for me, I hope it works for everyone else. I don't know about saving/loading simulations. The lights would probably go away but at least we can save the planets themselves and reuse them