Realism Mode

[DehAtomSmasher]

In short, a challenge if the game wasn't hard enough for some players.
the game is set in real time
the sizes of the systems and distances between planets (got some idea off the mod "the solar system to scale", but the NOT to scale version of it, the other one may be a nightmare of staring into empty space) are increased
that will make the player do anything to save fuel
there is also gravity (that awesome mod), In planets, if you don't escape the gravity, get burned in the atmosphere, end of your story. Gravity is strongest in the local star, plus there is a distance limit from the star that if you get past it, burn while trying to escape the gravity. it's like that challenge mod (i think its called dynamic systems) but made harder than ever. more things, like just getting your armor damaged can already cause hull breach, but not immediately destroying the ship, you get a chance to fix it. docking at a station could get your items stolen, plus a chance to get murdered if you catch the thieves.
you're not only thinking about your ship's status but also with your character. hunger, thirst, and other factors are observed. if i will expand it more my fingers would hurt typing this idea.

[pixelfck]

docking at a station could get your items stolen, plus a chance to get murdered if you catch the thieves.

I might borrow this idea and add it to the Black Market Expansion mod : )

[FourFire]

You already do get a chance to fix your armor... if it lowers to exactly 0HP, but any further damage beyond that, and you're dead.

The Teratons have a chance of stealing your high value items when you dock at one of their trading stations, this chance varies depending on your reactor power.

Gravity is a seperate mod than Dynamic Systems, but I agree that it's awesome, and potentially annoying, especially when your shots and missiles keep bending around massive bodies.

[Durendal]

Considering the vast distances of space...
It would take a long time to get anywhere. which wouldn't be so bad if you could shut down the program during journeys, and then start it up and load when you arrived. Dunno If i explained that very well.
example:
so you're set to travel to the fifth planet around LV-548, which is 'y' light minutes away. your onboard computer tells you that you can accelerate to only 'n'.c, and you will consume 'x'-kg of fuel in the process. so, you confirm the course and return to your desk job examining cat innards. And in 'y'/('n'.c) minutes you restart Transcendence and load your game, finding yourself just outside of the fifth planet's gravity well.

This sort of forced break from the game would really make things interesting. (see Vesper.5: http://mightyvision.blogspot.com/2012/08/vesper5.html )

But, I don't know if this sort of thing would be supported by the engine.

[Atarlost]

Even KSP supports time dilation. You can't get rid of that and still have a remotely playable game.

[Durendal]

Hmm? KSP? Sorry, I've never encountered this acronym before.

[RPC]

Kerbal Space Program. It's a space sim game (I think those are the right words?) https://kerbalspaceprogram.com/

[Vachtra]

A true autopilot for the game where you can tell it to go to a location, or follow a ship, would be useful here. Currently it's a "hurry up and fast forward through this part of the game" button.
Of course you would probably need an enemy detection alarm for incoming ships just in case, as well as an instant return to manual controls. This would still be in game though. I don't think out of game travel makes nearly as much sense for the game. For the Sol model I put together (not shared yet) I equipped the ship with an FTL drive for long flights. It took a minute to get to full speed, 10c, but it made travel easier. To return to normal drives just disable the FTL and hit the thrusters and you drop back to regular speeds. I set up travel stations to mark distant destinations a player might want to get to. Each one needs it's own travel station nearby to get new coordinates. Maybe a system coordinate map would be able to replace this and coordinates be put in manually into the targeting system. This could also help with getting lost in current systems when you get too far from the system.

Where is Alderaan anyway?

[Durendal]

Of course, Having a fully emulated Computer system Onboard to program my piloting subroutines would really solve all of my problems... but I'm getting ahead of myself.

[pip]

I think as far as "realism" goes, I'd be pretty happy just with all ships and stations being made to use the new damage displays like the large ships currently do.
Sort of like a cross between the new CoreEffects.xml and the Visible Damage mod.