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KSP Weekly: We’re back!


SQUAD

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36 minutes ago, Greenfire32 said:

Yeah! Backhanded passive-aggressive replies are SURE to win back the community who've supported Squad since the beginning and are now understandably concerned about KSP's future because the events of the last 6 months (include the MASS EXODUS of the ENTIRE dev team) have been SUPER worrying!

Keep up the GREAT work and remember: you've already got our money so who cares, right?

And comments like this are a GREAT way to ensure devs NEVER want to come out and give you information.

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On 1/6/2017 at 6:53 PM, SQUAD said:

On a related note the Steam client now lists 5 languages for KSP as options, but despite being shown, these are not active yet. This was done as part of the localization process, so do not despair if you cannot change the game’s language right now.

In case anyone else was curious:

DbCCJWK.png

I take it this must not be the final list if French is being worked on.

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2 hours ago, fourfa said:

You may have noticed that they stopped calling it "devnotes" and started calling it "KSP Weekly."

yeah they should cut that out 

EDIT: sorry is this to snarky? I'm still a bit bitter about dropping the art pass.

Edited by passinglurker
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4 minutes ago, passinglurker said:

yeah they should cut that out 

So you'd rather they called them something that they are not?

I too miss the long-format devnotes. But if they're gone, they're gone. Not gonna cry over milk someone else spilled, even if it was coming to my table.

Edited by 0111narwhalz
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16 hours ago, Greenfire32 said:

Yeah! Backhanded passive-aggressive replies are SURE to win back the community who've supported Squad since the beginning and are now understandably concerned about KSP's future because the events of the last 6 months (include the MASS EXODUS of the ENTIRE dev team) have been SUPER worrying!

Keep up the GREAT work and remember: you've already got our money so who cares, right?

I, for one, welcome our new alien overlo..... erhm *cough* I, for one, am not concerned about KSP's future. I've been playing KSP since 2013, and have gotten many times my money's worth out of it, so if everyone quit and Squad pulled the plug tomorrow, well, c'est la vie. But not EVERY dev quit, and it's been stated many times that turnover on long-running software projects is quite normal as developers get saturated and otherwise sick of working on the same project for years. They have hired new devs, who are understandably reluctant to come on the forums and expose themselves to unwarranted broadsides such as this.

Squad: Keep up the great work, and I hope you end the suspense and tell us what the new secret project is very soon!

jPUAI1n.png

I guess I should find a green monolith to make a new template

Edited by StrandedonEarth
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Just now, 0111narwhalz said:

So you'd rather they called them something that they are not?

I too miss the long-format devnotes. But if they're gone, they're gone. Not gonna cry over milk someone else spilled.

There are many things I'd rather. but if I'm vocal about them it seems trendy now to label people like me as anti-dev and if I'm silent about what I'd rather it feels like I'm voicing content or even support for incomplete art, unfinished career mode ballance, and an emphasis on making physical merch.

To be fair the devs have done a fantastic job defusing the rage surrounding the console bugs and canceled porkjet parts(aside from letting things sit till they came to a boil setting the president that we have to rage to get answers but eh no one's perfect) but without an announcement of future plans and features there is nothing be it positive, negative, or at the very least crunchy technical to fill the void and engage me leaving the "weekly news" feeling empty to me, and as I said before given squads history with "hyped up secret stuffs" the teasing of future plans does not fill me with confidence that things will get better.

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I'm happy to come in and chat about stuff when I have info to share or things I can chat about for sure, and I'm always keeping an eye on what people are interested in, so please don't stop expressing ideas, desires, concerns, food preferences or jokes :). The community is why KSP is such an engaging thing to be involved in and why its such a great place and project.

 

 

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41 minutes ago, TriggerAu said:

I'm happy to come in and chat about stuff when I have info to share or things I can chat about for sure, and I'm always keeping an eye on what people are interested in, so please don't stop expressing ideas, desires, concerns, food preferences or jokes :). The community is why KSP is such an engaging thing to be involved in and why its such a great place and project.

 

 

My desires are about KSP being a solid game in its own right without leaning on its modding capabilities as a crutch to provide a deeper experience than "quirky physics simulator" without going full realism overhaul and for that I honestly believe KSP needs a stock dv readout, a lot of ballance polish on the rocket parts and tech tree even if the art pass is on indefinite hold, and a deeper look at how all the career mode mechanics mesh together to make progression smoother (whereas right now I either leap frog over the early game as if it isn't there or flounder in it with no middle ground)

one could argue that modders could fix all this themselves but at least in kerbal's community I've rarely seen modders work in a collaborative fashion and tend to make more focused and surgical changes rather than broad overhauls like what is needed (the exception being RO and the unifying banner of simulator realism). the reason for this is the mess of placeholder stats and mechanics are so deep rooted its daunting for one man to tackle alone and to complex for a team of free volunteers to come to a consensus on its the sort of thing that needs a paid dev team to fix and for a while I thought it was finally going to happen once all the bugs were finally squashed, but then 1.2 was actually released ,and the rocket revamp was canceled

but yeah I get it its probably just a thing that only bothers me if some one is super serious about coherent part stats they shoulder the weight and use RO and if they want something lighter they loosen up and accept stock-alike as it is. Jeb plushies, VR IVA views, and life support updates would probably sell more copies and therefore be more worth the devs time anyway,

its still a fun game that many get 100's of hours out of in its current state so why improve what you already have right? 

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Could it be the multiplayer announcement I have long been waiting for?

Hi all! - Long time lurker, first time poster. I'm been playing KSP on and off since early(ish) beta, but am yet to get back into it since 1.2 dropped. 

I would dearly love a multiplayer option, as I enjoy the social aspects that certain games bring. I have been waiting a LONG time for multiplayer (we all know it was *promised* yonks ago) but alas my poor little kerbonauts are still floating around in deep space in their beautiful station with nobody to play with. I consider myself fairly in the loop when it comes to news announcements (or lack thereof) r.e. multiplayer but I find myself wondering; Why has there not been any official yay or nay from developers? I realise the KSP community is relatively split when it comes to MP, with some reasons being quite valid, and others fairly flawed and selfish. 

Just a friendly post I guess to let the devs know that some people are still waiting patiently for what was once listed as a future KSP feature. Even if it is eventually announced that KSP will not ever have an official MP, I will still look back with fondness on what has been an immensely fun and stimulating game, but I will unlikely play too much more. 

Cheers from Australia, Nathan

 

PS. I have tried DMP, but would prefer the more 'official' MP experience. 

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1 hour ago, passinglurker said:

My desires are about KSP being a solid game in its own right without leaning on its modding capabilities as a crutch to provide a deeper experience than "quirky physics simulator" without going full realism overhaul and for that I honestly believe KSP needs a stock dv readout, a lot of ballance polish on the rocket parts and tech tree even if the art pass is on indefinite hold, and a deeper look at how all the career mode mechanics mesh together to make progression smoother (whereas right now I either leap frog over the early game as if it isn't there or flounder in it with no middle ground)

*other good stuff that I deleted for brevity*

I appreciate that this is really a topic for the Suggestions and Development Discussion but this thread seems to have the ear of the developers right now, so I hope nobody minds if I jump in with a mild threadjack in support of @passinglurker.

Just for a bit of background, I'm currently playing a Science mode game and really enjoying it. It's about the longest running game of KSP that I've ever played, the current build (for me) is generally rock solid, I'm having a lot of fun with the CommNet mechanics and whoever decided to add an option to include kerbal xp in Science mode - well I'd like to shake them by the hand. If a similar option for allowing building upgrades could also be included (say by starting all buildings at Tier 1 and then automatically upgrading them once certain technologies are researched) then Science mode would be almost perfect for me. It would basically be a Sandbox game but with enough progression to it to suit my style of play, without needing to go into full Career Mode.

Better yet, I can think of a couple of mods that would then enhance my KSP experience but wouldn't be at all necessary to that experience. To borrow @passinglurker's phrase, the mods wouldn't be a crutch that the stock game mechanics are leaning on.

Career mode though I just can't get on with (and I have tried several times). For me, it needs something else - something that meshes with the other gameplay mechanics to lend depth to the game. At the moment, Career mode feels like a single tent pole (the contracts system) stuck in the ground with no support and with the rest of the tent hanging off it. It kind of works but it doesn't take much to knock it over and it would be better to have a couple more poles in there somewhere to make a more stable structure.

Hopefully the Super Secret Update will do that. :) 

Edited by KSK
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6 hours ago, passinglurker said:

My desires are about KSP being a solid game in its own right without leaning on its modding capabilities as a crutch to provide a deeper experience than "quirky physics simulator" without going full realism overhaul and for that I honestly believe KSP needs a stock dv readout, a lot of ballance polish on the rocket parts and tech tree even if the art pass is on indefinite hold, and a deeper look at how all the career mode mechanics mesh together to make progression smoother (whereas right now I either leap frog over the early game as if it isn't there or flounder in it with no middle ground)

Stock d-v is a good solid suggestion, and I have seen one or more responses to that request that basically say 'this is really hard to get right but we are looking at it'.  Question: do you have any recommendations on where to put the read-out?  Should it be in-flight, in the editor, or in the tracking station?  Any specific place on the screen seem like the right place to you?  Should it be all stages(takes a lot of space), the current stage only, or all stages added together? 

(Thought: what if remaining d-v was listed in the fuel bar for activated engines?  As you have both the engines and the fuel already selected, it should be fairly easy to calculate the d-v from just going full throttle until the tanks are empty.  This has the added benefit of letting you see how your remaining d-v improves as you stage off empty tanks/stages, but not needing to worry about the fiddly bits of future stages.  Not sure about the best way to handle it in the VAB though, other than perhaps putting it in the engineers report.)

 

Could you please give more specific details on what about the rocket parts you feel needs better balance(Keeping in mind that several parts are using realistic weights based on real-world rockets, like the Mk1 capsule and the mk2-3 capsule where the difference in mission profiles is why they do not seem 'balanced' against each other in game)

Similarly with the Tech Tree, can you give any specific examples of things you feel are not working properly, or need to be moved around?

Generally speaking, when something seems to be working, waving your hand at it and saying 'fix this' tends to get a response roughly equivalent to a shoulder shrug.  While requests such as 'could you please adjust the terrier and poodle ISPs so that the poodle is more efficient due to being a larger and more advanced engine' will get a lot more attention. (note: poodle is 350 and terrier is 345 so this is already the case, but I needed an example request)

4 hours ago, KSK said:

Career mode though I just can't get on with (and I have tried several times). For me, it needs something else - something that meshes with the other gameplay mechanics to lend depth to the game. At the moment, Career mode feels like a single tent pole (the contracts system) stuck in the ground with no support and with the rest of the tent hanging off it. It kind of works but it doesn't take much to knock it over and it would be better to have a couple more poles in there somewhere to make a more stable structure.

Do you have any suggestions or recommendations for how to make Career mode better?

As far as I am aware, they want to avoid having a specific 'end point' as many will then stop playing without exploring the entire game, and other than adding a specific story line(which must by definition have an end point), I have a hard time thinking of ways to make career better other than just adding in my favorite mods.

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On 1/7/2017 at 8:02 PM, Wallygator said:

Is it only my perception, or is this dev note one of the most non-descript ever posted?

"Super-secret" - isn't that something that you should never ever mention exists?  Jeeze...  Oh sorry, perhaps it was meant to be written in a cali-style with "Super-cute" inflection. If so, then perhaps every other word should have been like "like".  Yes, that was a style dig. Criticism intended with imbedded sarcasm. (SERIOUSLY: I don't understand the strategy of telling people that something exists, but that no further details are available. What is the realised value in that? Having readers speculate? Not helpful, unless you release actual information that can seed the speculation in a positive direction to generate buzz.  Otherwise it appears strictly amateur.

From my perspective, it is very highly likely that what we are now seeing is a "dev-note" format formally driven by DEVS and now completely driven by brand - now existing as a pure communications activity that feeds on only a small bit of development details - with the effect of creating an insulating barrier between the community and the development team. Perhaps this is what is desired just in case there are further changes to the cadre. Frankly, I'm Ok with that - however, it should not restrict communication of higher level of details than currently provided.

In the past I found myself looking forward to the details in the weekly dev notes. Now, I find myself looking at the KSP weekly only half the time, and then usually days later than usual.  WHY? Because I find there to no little or no "real information" being communicated.  And what is communicated lacks the details that the community craves to understand and contribute to.

This now contributes to a very poor showing from Squad - who need to step up their game.  IMHO actual degradation of KSP appears to be now in progress - accelerating just like sea ice retreat...

You [Squad] created a supportive and engaged community based not only on a great game, but ALSO on how you nurtured and communicated to your users and community members with details and perspectives across a number of aspects of the game and your thinking.  Personally, I do not see the same attention to detail presently in action.

Finally, any excuses such as "oh and we just came back from break so there isn't a lot to say" are completely disingenuous.

While I commend all attempts at stabilising and formatting news and information, I have now abandoned my patience with this new format. I won't stop reading it from time to time, but it has fallen down my ladder of KSP information sources.  I sincerely hope improvements can be made.

Something I love about this comment just as much as it's content is the fact that it's pretty much as long as the devnotes themselves.

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1 hour ago, Terwin said:

Do you have any suggestions or recommendations for how to make Career mode better?

As far as I am aware, they want to avoid having a specific 'end point' as many will then stop playing without exploring the entire game, and other than adding a specific story line(which must by definition have an end point), I have a hard time thinking of ways to make career better other than just adding in my favorite mods.

Plenty - and they don't involve adding a storyline either - but I figured I was doing enough of a thread-jack without getting into details. They also involve a lot of reworking of Career mode, which would probably (and I quite understand why) make them a non-starter. With all that said, here's a quick summary that I posted on another thread.

Spoiler

 

So what to do?

Building on the current system, I would make Kerbal Construction Time (KCT), or something very like it, stock. When time actually matters then a lot of other decisions suddenly matter as well. Can I actually complete that contract in time? Can I research the necessary technology to get my cluster of Eve comsats on orbit for the next transfer window? That sort of thing. Also KCT adds a whole slew of possible upgrade options for the Space Centre, which makes the base upgrade side of the game a bit deeper. In short, it's a relatively straightforward way of building out the space program (rather than individual mission) planning part of the game, which is what I thought Career mode would be all about.

Yes - I know I could just install the mod. Yes - I need to get round to that sometime.

More speculatively (and I've said this before), take anything @tater has said about the exploration game and just do it. Keep the current Kerbol system as a default option but for the love of Jeb's sweaty socks, give us some variety too. Give us something to actually explore.

In an ideal world, I'd rip up Career mode and rebuild it from scratch. KCT is actually quite a solid foundation (for the reasons outlined above), so I'd start there. For those that haven't used it, KCT lets you earn science by building rockets. I would make that the main progression loop that drives technology progression. Build spacecraft, earn Engineering experience points and use them to unlock better parts for building better spacecraft. Put in a diminishing returns mechanism so you can't cheese your way through the tech tree by churning out endless 'Mk1 pod + Flea' suborbital hoppers.

Next - make life support stock. Doesn't have to be a complicated system but give us some logistics to figure out and manage.

Next - proper kerbonaut training and career logs. Give us a reason to care about them, give us a reason to actually manage them, allocate them to appropriate missions etc. Get rid of the current 'get to level 3 and now I can repair wheels / magically get more science from a thermometer / figure out how to orient my craft antinormal rather than prograde' nonsense. Instead a spacecraft needs a certain level of crew training before you can launch it. Crew accumulate training over time, the more experienced a particular kerbonaut is, the faster he/she accumulates training points.

Next - tie reputation to exploration and science. Boldly going where no kerbal (or probe) has gone before - and beaming back the pictures to prove it - keep the public interested and earns reputation for your program. Repeat missions also earn rep but on a diminishing returns basis. Likewise, gathering science points earns you the approbation of the Kerbin research community and builds your reputation.

Finally - let us choose how we want to earn our funds.

Reputation grants you a 'base salary' to spend on your program. If you have a sufficiently high reputation, that might be all you need.

Running tourist flights will earn you money - build your ship, set your price and see the punters roll in. Or not. Passengers will generally pay more to go to more exotic locations in more spacious spacecraft. Conversely, once the novelty has worn off, passengers won't pay much for the 'privilege' of being cooped up in a Mk1 pod for a month, regardless of how good the view is.

Building infrastructure like space stations and Munbases will also earn you money - building nicer infrastructure will earn you more money. Building infrastructure in far-flung parts of the Kerbol system will earn you even more money. I would probably leave the task of building and maintaining the infrastructure to the player but have passenger transport handled automagically - or at least make that an option.

Building and maintaining commercial comsat networks will earn you money. Alternatively, building networks of Kerbin observation and other science satellites, space telescopes etc. will earn you science and therefore reputation and so (indirectly) money.

Finally, if you really insist, testing parts and accepting contracts from other companies will earn you money. In general though, I'd prefer to ditch the notion of contracts and having the player earn all their money by completing random tasks for faceless companies.

 

Some of this could be achieved through mods - KCT and Final Frontier for example. But the expanded ways of earning funds and the changes to kerbonaut training would require significant changes to the current gameplay mechanics. I'm sure there's also plenty to disagree with here but hopefully it's at least a coherent set of suggestions.

Edited by KSK
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9 hours ago, TriggerAu said:

I'm happy to come in and chat about stuff when I have info to share or things I can chat about for sure, and I'm always keeping an eye on what people are interested in, so please don't stop expressing ideas, desires, concerns, food preferences or jokes :). The community is why KSP is such an engaging thing to be involved in and why its such a great place and project.

 

 

 

I like tacos.

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43 minutes ago, Terwin said:

Stock d-v is a good solid suggestion, and I have seen one or more responses to that request that basically say 'this is really hard to get right but we are looking at it'.  Question: do you have any recommendations on where to put the read-out?  Should it be in-flight, in the editor, or in the tracking station?  Any specific place on the screen seem like the right place to you?  Should it be all stages(takes a lot of space), the current stage only, or all stages added together? 

(Thought: what if remaining d-v was listed in the fuel bar for activated engines?  As you have both the engines and the fuel already selected, it should be fairly easy to calculate the d-v from just going full throttle until the tanks are empty.  This has the added benefit of letting you see how your remaining d-v improves as you stage off empty tanks/stages, but not needing to worry about the fiddly bits of future stages.  Not sure about the best way to handle it in the VAB though, other than perhaps putting it in the engineers report.)

I'm not gonna rage if they make something barebones basic or even half baked the important thing right now is that it happens at all. In terms of an interface I believe the simplest implementation to be being able to highlight or select an entire stage using the stageing sidebar and being shown the potential and current dv of that stage. more detailed implementation and over views can be added as seen fit later but basic dv in some way shape or form is most important even if its as half baked as the unused part upgrade system (that and maybe a twr read out too >.>)
 

54 minutes ago, Terwin said:

Could you please give more specific details on what about the rocket parts you feel needs better balance

I wish I could but carreer mode is inherently complex and I am not a salaried game designer that wants to sit down and crunch all the numbers for the sake of my next paycheck I'm just here for a good time. If it was thier own creative decision I would respect that but I've followed development and most importantly the nitty gritty cfg file stats since 0.23.5 I know that most of the parts catalog was assembled from placeholders with little testing for balance as it wasn't a priority at the time. Changes only came if something was very broken and people were loud enough, the parts were replaced with better art versions like when the space plane overhaul was completed, or because things needed to be band-aid'ed back up after a big mechanics over haul like the new aero.
 

1 hour ago, Terwin said:

(Keeping in mind that several parts are using realistic weights based on real-world rockets, like the Mk1 capsule and the mk2-3 capsule where the difference in mission profiles is why they do not seem 'balanced' against each other in game)

I do not prescribe to this excuse and I see it as flimsy. The parts catalog is a cobbling of place holders who themes and intents were based on the shifting whims at the time they were implemented with limited bandaid patches applied later to assume anything else would be grasping for straws. anyway personally I believe we have realism overhaul for "real-world" stating so stock parts should be massed based on whats good for progression and gameplay a small surgical change based on any other form of logic cause someone thinks it would make sense would have ripple effects across the entire system. there needs to be one sort of sense and that sense applied to all not have some real world and some quirky, but as I said before the problem is broad and deep rooted and to much for one man to find a solution except for maybe @FlowerChild say what you want about BTSM it was at least consistent and had a thoughtful flow of progression if a bit challenging.
 

1 hour ago, Terwin said:

Similarly with the Tech Tree, can you give any specific examples of things you feel are not working properly, or need to be moved around?

this is easier get rid of tutorial like progression (we have real tutorials now) and sort branches by manufacturer making each branch that manufacturers vision of a space program ran entirely by them for you to mix and match ok its not really that easy again this is part of a big cog in a bigger machine and it all needs to mesh together right giving specific targeted problems and solutions will just result in other unforeseen problems what is needed is a broad overhaul and again I'd rather leave it to someone who gets a paycheck for figuring stuff like this out (or gets a paycheck for shutting me down if there is a rhyme or reason to the current balance I'd love to hear it from a dev speculative excuses by other users is wasted on me)
 

1 hour ago, Terwin said:

Generally speaking, when something seems to be working, waving your hand at it and saying 'fix this' tends to get a response roughly equivalent to a shoulder shrug.  While requests such as 'could you please adjust the terrier and poodle ISPs so that the poodle is more efficient due to being a larger and more advanced engine' will get a lot more attention. (note: poodle is 350 and terrier is 345 so this is already the case, but I needed an example request)

I'd be agreeing with you if ksp wasn't made from taped together place holders whose polishing is perpetually put off, and actually had some attention to detail applied to its game play, but I haven't seen that. The coding placeholders were polished off in 1.2 now we need the same for the gameplay assets

 

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On 7/01/2017 at 1:53 PM, SQUAD said:

Thanks the community’s feedback, we were able to track a bug that involves raised/clipped areas on the runway when a Kerbal is doing an EVA on it. This ridge does not only look weird, but it causes small planes to bounce, or even destroys landing gear

Yay, finally some mention of the terrain seams...
But you think this problem is confined to the runway? Seriously? :confused: What about the blindingly obvious seams on every planetary surface?
You guys have someone on the team who has actually played 1.2.x for more than 5 minutes, right?

Edited by steve_v
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Also in the Localization Testing pipeline is something to ensure that the "Neil Armstrong" Mun monomuent, when read by immigrant gangsters from the 1930's, says, "I would like to direct this to the distinguished members of the panel: You lousy cork-soakers. You have violated my farging rights. Dis somanumbatching country was founded so that the liberties of common patriotic citizens like me could not be taken away by a bunch of fargin iceholes... like yourselves."

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1 hour ago, passinglurker said:

I wish I could but carreer mode is inherently complex and I am not a salaried game designer that wants to sit down and crunch all the numbers for the sake of my next paycheck I'm just here for a good time. If it was thier own creative decision I would respect that but I've followed development and most importantly the nitty gritty cfg file stats since 0.23.5 I know that most of the parts catalog was assembled from placeholders with little testing for balance as it wasn't a priority at the time. Changes only came if something was very broken and people were loud enough, the parts were replaced with better art versions like when the space plane overhaul was completed, or because things needed to be band-aid'ed back up after a big mechanics over haul like the new aero.

Considering that just about every part has it's backers(see the various 'parts you never use' threads) who like it just the way it is, there is not really any one 'uber part' that every one feels they must use, and it is not uncommon for someone who is having problems to be informed that there are other parts more suited to their purpose, I would propose that the parts list is reasonably well balanced against itself unless you can provide specific counter-examples.

 

1 hour ago, passinglurker said:

I'd be agreeing with you if ksp wasn't made from taped together place holders whose polishing is perpetually put off, and actually had some attention to detail applied to its game play, but I haven't seen that. The coding placeholders were polished off in 1.2 now we need the same for the gameplay assets

This sounds a lot like 'This feels broken to me, so fix it!' with no useful details or elaboration.

If the Devs felt that the current game-play had serious problems, I expect they would have addressed it by now, without that, we are left to assume they are reasonably happy with the current system, and unless you can provide specific examples on how to make it better, you do not seem to be providing much useful substance to the conversation.

 

Personally, I feel that the game has had a lot of polish.  Sure it would be nice to get better performance, but there is a whole lot of math going on behind the scenes, so I am uncertain how much performance can even be improved at this point.

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47 minutes ago, Terwin said:

Considering that just about every part has it's backers(see the various 'parts you never use' threads) who like it just the way it is, there is not really any one 'uber part' that every one feels they must use, and it is not uncommon for someone who is having problems to be informed that there are other parts more suited to their purpose, I would propose that the parts list is reasonably well balanced against itself unless you can provide specific counter-examples.

If I provide specific examples you will simply work to defuse them and explain and excuse them all away, but the problem isn't individual parts individually they are fine the problem is much broader and can't be defined by individual nitpics. When parts are brought together the sloppy place holdings begin to show if you look at the stats any rhyme, reason, or pattern you find is very short lived extending to 2 or 3 other parts that were released or changed around the same time (trust me I've tried to make a stock balanced mod its madness its like a minefield where it's impossible not to conflict with another small pattern in the meta). Thanks to the coding polish the flying part of the game most of the community focuses on is fun stats don't matter that much in sandbox so they see no problem, but thanks to the sloppy inconsistencies with the part stats and progression the building, engineering, and managment parts of the feels like you are just using the top 10 most exploity parts over and over.
 

47 minutes ago, Terwin said:

This sounds a lot like 'This feels broken to me, so fix it!' with no useful details or elaboration.

I shouldn't need to crunch all the numbers and do squads job for them to prove this. Nobody had to find all the bugs in the code before squad would be convinced they needed a bug squash update so I shouldn't have to write the whole gameplay side of things for them to prove that ksp was built on a pile of placeholders assets that they procrastinated returning to that still need to refined and polished they were the ones that implemented these parts they know hat they have done, (and to be clear again the individual parts are of good individual quality nothing against roverdude, nova skilo, porkjet, or any other part,cfg author's individual examples of work. The sloppiness stems from how the parts fit together and just like there is a disparity and clash with the different art styles there is a disparity and clash with the different balance styles that needs to be sorted out.
 

47 minutes ago, Terwin said:

If the Devs felt that the current game-play had serious problems, I expect they would have addressed it by now, without that, we are left to assume they are reasonably happy with the current system, and unless you can provide specific examples on how to make it better, you do not seem to be providing much useful substance to the conversation.

lets see steady methodical development was interrupted by a sudden greedy rush to 1.0 release in order to be able to have a cut rate mobile game house with no console experience port a game from a small studio who also had no console experience... honestly you put to much faith in squad to do the smart thing, and I'm seeing your desire for specific examples as simply bait to try to open holes in my arguments and shut me down by debate so I won't be entertaining that.
 

47 minutes ago, Terwin said:

Personally, I feel that the game has had a lot of polish.  Sure it would be nice to get better performance, but there is a whole lot of math going on behind the scenes, so I am uncertain how much performance can even be improved at this point.

yes I agree there is polish the fewer bugs, and more stable running performance means flying missions is more enjoyable than ever, but I insist based on my own detailed analysis of the part stats that there isn't as much math behind the scenes as you assume. Ask any stock alike mod author and ask them what goes through thier heads when they try to balance parts they add to the game to mesh with stock, and they will tell you stock is anything but balanced. meaning the building and management side of the game still suffers.

Edited by passinglurker
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49 minutes ago, passinglurker said:

I'm seeing your desire for specific examples as simply bait to try to open holes in my arguments and shut me down by debate so I won't be entertaining that.

"I can't win by making valid arguments, so I'm just going to assert that I'm correct"?

That's not really the best way to convince people that change is needed.  You haven't been asked to do a full analysis of the game, just provide some details beyond "I don't like <X>, so it should be different."

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15 minutes ago, razark said:

"I can't win by making valid arguments, so I'm just going to assert that I'm correct"?

That's not really the best way to convince people that change is needed.  You haven't been asked to do a full analysis of the game, just provide some details beyond "I don't like <X>, so it should be different."

he's asking for specifics when specifics isn't the problem. nature of forum debate means I'm making that same argument over and over in half a dozen different ways naturally some will be less effective than others but by all means feel free to pick the weakest and ignore all other points that's the best way to convince anyone.

 

1 hour ago, passinglurker said:

and to be clear again the individual parts are of good individual quality nothing against roverdude, nova skilo, porkjet, or any other part,cfg author's individual examples of work. The sloppiness stems from how the parts fit together and just like there is a disparity and clash with the different art styles there is a disparity and clash with the different balance styles that needs to be sorted out.

anyway here is the crux of my argument I feel is the strongest if you would like something fair to discuss. essentially be it with art style or balance style if I gave specific examples of how parts clashed there will be specific counter examples of how parts fit as if that makes it alright when really things shouldn't be clashing at all (or at least so heavily)

Edited by passinglurker
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1 hour ago, passinglurker said:

If I provide specific examples you will simply work to defuse them and explain and excuse them all away, but the problem isn't individual parts individually they are fine the problem is much broader and can't be defined by individual nitpics. When parts are brought together the sloppy place holdings begin to show if you look at the stats any rhyme, reason, or pattern you find is very short lived extending to 2 or 3 other parts that were released or changed around the same time (trust me I've tried to make a stock balanced mod its madness its like a minefield where it's impossible not to conflict with another small pattern in the meta). Thanks to the coding polish the flying part of the game most of the community focuses on is fun stats don't matter that much in sandbox so they see no problem, but thanks to the sloppy inconsistencies with the part stats and progression the building, engineering, and managment parts of the feels like you are just using the top 10 most exploity parts over and over.
 

I shouldn't need to crunch all the numbers and do squads job for them to prove this. Nobody had to find all the bugs in the code before squad would be convinced they needed a bug squash update so I shouldn't have to write the whole gameplay side of things for them to prove that ksp was built on a pile of placeholders assets that they procrastinated returning to that still need to refined and polished they were the ones that implemented these parts they know hat they have done, (and to be clear again the individual parts are of good individual quality nothing against roverdude, nova skilo, porkjet, or any other part,cfg author's individual examples of work. The sloppiness stems from how the parts fit together and just like there is a disparity and clash with the different art styles there is a disparity and clash with the different balance styles that needs to be sorted out.

Ok, I think I am getting a handle on one of your concerns:

You feel that the parts are a mish-mash and not consistent with each other.

To that I would point out that while LFO tanks have been balanced against each other(@1600 units/ton of tank) and while the Mk1 LF tank holds the same number of units/ton, the Mk0 LF tank can hold 2000 units per ton of tank.  While the Mk2 and Mk3 LF tanks are all heavier than the LFO rocket tanks(1300-1400 LF/ton).  I have heard explanations that the Mk2 and 3 tanks have improvements in other stats(like max temp and collision tolerance), but that does not explain the Mk0 tank.  And this is after the rocket tanks got a balance overhaul to give them all the same mass/capacity ratio.  So this would support your conjecture that the parts are not yet fully balanced(wow, the NCS adapter only holds 800LF/ton).

Suggestion: If you list the specific parts or categories you think need the most balancing, that will focus the attention on the parts you think need it most.

---

Is this a reasonable assessment of your parts related concern?

Could you try re-phrasing your other concern(s) so I can try and tease out a constructive recommendation for those as well?

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58 minutes ago, Terwin said:

Ok, I think I am getting a handle on one of your concerns:

You feel that the parts are a mish-mash and not consistent with each other.

To that I would point out that while LFO tanks have been balanced against each other(@1600 units/ton of tank) and while the Mk1 LF tank holds the same number of units/ton, the Mk0 LF tank can hold 2000 units per ton of tank.  While the Mk2 and Mk3 LF tanks are all heavier than the LFO rocket tanks(1300-1400 LF/ton).  I have heard explanations that the Mk2 and 3 tanks have improvements in other stats(like max temp and collision tolerance), but that does not explain the Mk0 tank.  And this is after the rocket tanks got a balance overhaul to give them all the same mass/capacity ratio.  So this would support your conjecture that the parts are not yet fully balanced(wow, the NCS adapter only holds 800LF/ton).

Suggestion: If you list the specific parts or categories you think need the most balancing, that will focus the attention on the parts you think need it most.

---

Is this a reasonable assessment of your parts related concern?

Could you try re-phrasing your other concern(s) so I can try and tease out a constructive recommendation for those as well?

Yup the fuel tanks is one of many examples but like I said the the inconsistencies are very prevalent and deeply rooted another reason I was against specific examples is that one needs only to look at thier own copy of the game to quickly find thier own examples so I think it's fair to save time and not bother listing all the problems.

As for categories I feel in need of balancing I'd honestly say all of them. Each small pattern of consistency only extends to a handful of other parts sometimes with overlap between categories and even if we limited this down to a few offending categories any fix could potentially render the untouched categories inconsistent with those fixes.

The problem has to be tackled as a whole by the devs basically and I'd respect what decisions the devs make concerning balance if they actually did try to balance the game but since it's apparent the part stats is still essentially a cobbling of individually well made but mis matched placeholders that have barely been touched since I feel compelled to put pressure on this issue.

Edited by passinglurker
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