i think at this point its all about assumptions since nobody has given any technical implementation details… So all we have to do is misinterpret and make conclusions based on our assumptions.
Ive seen “a light dusting of destructable terrain”, “1 foot or two of duggable”, “Diggable to bedrock, but no overhang”,
People are going to make these jumps until they get details – Similar to the assumption that it would only be a foot or two.
Everyone is wrong until we find out who’s right. 
a two weekly wipe would be awesome for the builders and risk takers out there. You need to move everything once every two weeks (vulnerable) and you get another chance to set up something different, try something else, experiment a bit… 'well if it doesnt work, we do something else next cycle…'
also it will give a way more dynamic playfield… every cycle a new board to play on. I would like that very much.
Another idea in this context and something I just would love to see:
(if there is no persistent pvp planets with lasting bases, this also would fill that need)
there could be (a) pve planet(s) with no resources, no diggable soil, simple terrain (desert eg) where people can make a small / low level base/safe stash/palace, this would form a city?! The city at elemental is nice, but doesnt allow a lot of expression 
It could be like a planet where people can set up a shop, make a pub, have a faction palace recruiting board with info… w/e. we can think of. Like the only safe spot left in the universe, there’s tons of ways to get a storyline fitting
There could be portals, perhaps a parking area just out of orbit for CV’s… perhaps make a public transport system and not allow vehicles on the planet to keep cores in check… possibilities 
it would be great for immersion and for the community as a central point.
just throwing it out there. I would love to see that
(edit) I agree that the poll is not very clear. I didnt even understand option 3 meant a few feet of digging allowed. That doesnt solve being outranged, and doesnt give any extra protection. all or nothing imo
I don’t know if this idea has been floated yet as there are now way to many responses to go through, but what about designing worlds with subterranean features and hiding caverns, caves, and entrances with mineral deposits. As much as I like the performance of option 3, I agree that it will take a certain sandbox elements, as well as exploration and creativity elements out of the game. So why not design worlds with subterranean caves and caverns already, some worlds can have a small system and other worlds can be underground adventures with “shifting plates and lava flows.” This way you should be able to up the performance because the worlds are not having tons and tons of new information written over them and players can explore and build in caves and caverns. Entrances to the system can be hidden by deposits, alien bases, possible friendly or hostile, and the caverns can be made to fit both large and small bases. They can contain mineral deposits that could be refreshed by “lava or shifting plates” however you want to write it as well as giant monsters or other points of interest.
I'm curious. What will be taken out next to improve performance?
Capital Vessels cant be restricted anymore. So now planets will
be restricted until we are fighting over featureless marbles.
Why can’t they be restricted any longer?
IMO any further restrictions on capital vessels will relegate them to cargo hauling troop transport.
Balance is always a matter of give and take, especially when playing Alphas. The whole process involves them doing thing that may or may not work, then changing or enhancing them, or removing them all together. In the final game, new player will never know what they lost or gained, it will just be a finished product.
We’re signing up to play it in its state, and the many states between now and GA. Just kind of the way it is. Maybe CV’s will actually be hulking cargo / troop transports and all fighting happens in SV’s. We’ll only know by playing along or waiting for the finished product.
From what i’ve seen, there are improvements in the combat. Still not ready for 5v5 CV battles, but it appears better. We can only expect better to be the primary goal of these releases - It just may not be our specific flavor of better this go around.
No restrictions needed anymore in 6.0.5 experimental CV’s can only fire cannon and auto on planet no other gun not even manual guns can fire, so its fine now if they can enter planets, building on planets is a lot more viable now especially with the temperatures making it even harder to raid on foot.
Love the cave idea, they can make those walls almost flat with low polygons so that the caves can be vast without having too much tessellation, it would make base defense even more hardcore, meaning it would take more than 1 night to fully raid a base.
hmm not really cause they have lot more devices, especially thrusters to drain performance.
Caves are interesting yeah… let’s see
This is already the case, as of the most recent 5.x release
@Kogami just found out why his CV abase raids have been so fail lately. 
Was chatting about this one on global today.
Imagining a prefabbed warren of tunnels with dead ends and large and small caverns suitable for building a base inside of. The lack of destructible terrain means defense tactics change and fighting over the best biggest caves and protecting or taking over intersections and choke points becomes a new thing.
Would add a different dimension for sure.
I lol’ed, removing a dimension then adding another.
I know this sounds strange but what about when you dig you don’t create new triangles but just move those vertices up and down with the drill, in order for textures not to stretch too much it could use a formula to not let the angle be too high between verts and once that angle gets reached it starts effecting the verts next to it and next to that and so on, we would be able to make mountains dig rivers and so on but we wont be able to make tunnels, and the terrain wont get any more subdiv’s.
lol unfortunately that looks like boiled garbage in unity. I tried that as a space saving measure in a game a few years back for an assignment. The reason why digging is enjoyable in empyrion is because it is clean, and behaves the way you would expect consistently. With a system where you just raise or lower the ground itself, let alone one where you attempt to create no new vertices, you wind up with a massively immersion breaking magic hole creation game. And it gets ridiculous fast. lol
Haha, you have a point, things always look different in your head until you try it.
My idea was to have a whole world with a giant subterranean system with large and small caves leading all over the place and the deeper you explore into the world the better the resources. Cave sizes would automatically help restrict HV and SV sizes. I was hoping that resources could be randomized in type and size every week. The resources could also block other caves and caverns leading to different parts of the subterranean system. No one should be allowed to access AM’s or OCD’s while on the surface or underground, make it real survival for everyone. Have limits on vessels and bases like Armageddon. It could be made more interesting by adding in some drones or aliens.
The problem with have an extensive cave system is it likely has similar performance issues. Rust and Ark both have caves but they are rather small compared to the game world.
Indeed. It would still put a drag on performance due to extra mesh to handle. However Given it would t change ever, at least its predicable.