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KSP Weekly: Without labor nothing prospers


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1 minute ago, adsii1970 said:

Agreed. I want to play a game and enjoy it. I want to be able to destress. Trying to make something fly and have parts just break seems more like extra stress than extra fun, especially if it becomes a general game setting for all parts and cannot be toggled off.

I think they'd have to include an on/off switch in the settings for something like this.

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3 minutes ago, 0111narwhalz said:

Sorry, it was intended to be a pointed "Devs, you'd better have done this," not an actual assertion of fact.

That's alright.  My response was really more of a recall to the fact I asked the question much earlier in the thread and got ignored.

 

 

2 minutes ago, Just Jim said:

I think they'd have to include an on/off switch in the settings for something like this.

If it's in missions, I don't think it should be disabled.  If it applies to other game modes, it should be an option.  I use one of the failure mods, because I like the extra challenge, and it adds texture to the game rather than a constant stream of launch, do thing, land, repeat.  (However, I use the one that only causes failure during launch, so read that as you like...)

Edited by razark
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6 minutes ago, razark said:

If it's in missions, I don't think it should be disabled.  If it applies to other game modes, it should be an option.  I use one of the failure mods, because I like the extra challenge, and it adds texture to the game rather than a constant stream of launch, do thing, land, repeat.  (However, I use the one that only causes failure during launch, so read that as you like...)

I like the thought of an extra challenge as well... but I'm a bit of a glutton for punishment.  In games like CFS3, my favorite part is when you're low on ammo and fuel and just trying to get home, and suddenly get jumped by a squad of BF-109's... awww crap! Now it gets real.... and you find out the hard way just how good a pilot you really are.

I love the idea of something unexpected happening during a launch, or whatever, and then having to deal with it... somehow.

But I also get people absolutely not wanting something like this, which is why I strongly suggest @SQUAD includes an on/off feature.

 

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It's rather funny how people immediately fear that this part failure feature is a mandatory part of the game. When, if you're thinking in the context of history and new mission planning features, you are more likely to be encountering failures as orchestrated by a mission author. If camera wobble and building destruction are features that we can disable in a menu, why wouldn't part failure be? People need to stop expecting the worst. 

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14 minutes ago, TheKosmonaut said:

If camera wobble and building destruction are features that we can disable in a menu, why wouldn't part failure be?

Because this is the internet!

I do find it odd that we're getting part failures, but we still don't have life support.

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Just now, klgraham1013 said:

[...] but we still don't have life support.

What is dead may never die... 

But really, life support would make sense as a feature down the road, especially when recreating an Apollo XIII like situation (hello part failure). The problem is that, in the scope of what we are talking about right now, fixing a failure to life support by using duct tape, a hose, and a box, isnt really doable in KSP. I do agree though, I would like to see LS sometime. For now, I am perfectly fine with the mods I use for that. 

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22 minutes ago, TheKosmonaut said:

"... you are more likely to be encountering failures as orchestrated by a mission author."

I would consider part failures scripted by a mission author to be more on the order of "sabotage" than an operational event.

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As long as we're on the topic of part failures, I think part failures would be made 100x more fun if there was some kind of KAS-like feature built in to the game. It would make repair missions possible and fun (and open up a excrements ton of exciting new gameplay possibilities elsewhere).

Imagine this: you've sent up a communications satellite, but its long range antenna failed. No biggie. You send your best engineer up in an SSTO. You dock the failed satellite into the spaceplane's cargo bay, where a replacement antenna is waiting. Your engineer jetpacks over to the cargo bay and gets into a command seat to brace himself while he works. He detaches the faulty antenna and lets it drift off into space, then attaches the replacement he's brought up.

I think it would be really fun.

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Players inflict part failures on themselves already with Testflight, Dang It! and Kerbalism (plus others I'm sure) so there's certainly an appetite for it (like RemoteTech or DRE previously)

Early rockets were unreliable (11 or the first 23 Titan-II flights failed for instance), making them reliable enough to trust peoples lives to (and then only with contingencies) was part of the space race which players may want to confront.

Maybe it'll be like Testflight?, perform tests and run engines (or other parts) to gather data improving their reliability

Either way, I'm sure it'll be an optional

On the other hand, I hope the outcomes are more fine grained rather than just 100%-to-0%, and that Kerbals might be able to field repair some failures.

I also hope the temperature system is upgraded to take difficulties regarding low temperatures into account too

Another thing to consider is that part failures without any kind of life support requirement would be, well, not meaningless but certainly a soft failure sort of thing, since having crew stuck somewhere doesn't come with any kind of time pressure

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1 hour ago, TheKosmonaut said:

when recreating an Apollo XIII like situation (hello part failure). The problem is that, in the scope of what we are talking about right now, fixing a failure to life support by using duct tape, a hose, and a box, isnt really doable in KSP.

In fact, are there any gameplay elements that could be applied to an Apollo 13 scenario? From the KSP perspective of launches, burns, and patched conics, all they really did was stay on course for their free return trajectory.

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Regarding part failures, one thing that seems impossible at the moment is (semi) failing control surfaces & landing gear. It would help if these need a resource to function. I once started a hydraulics mod years ago and had the resource system working (pumps, buffers, reservoirs) ... just no way to hook it up.

One thing I'd really like is jet engines heating up a little more like we had in 1.0.2. Not the temperature of the exhaust stream, that's fine. The engines themselves stay cool, even when operating in a shielded environment. And when they overheat, would be lovely if they gradually fail or just stop functioning instead of ... blowing up. Then you'd still have the mass & drag.

54 minutes ago, HebaruSan said:

In fact, are there any gameplay elements that could be applied to an Apollo 13 scenario? From the KSP perspective of launches, burns, and patched conics, all they really did was stay on course for their free return trajectory.

Failing RCS system perhaps? Maybe control over a limited set of nozzles.

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17 minutes ago, Azimech said:

Failing RCS system perhaps? Maybe control over a limited set of nozzles.

That could be implemented, but is it needed for the mission? There's no docking, and the orientation only matters at the end when it kind of takes care of itself thanks to the CM's aerodynamic properties.

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2 hours ago, TheKosmonaut said:

It's rather funny how people immediately fear that this part failure feature is a mandatory part of the game. When, if you're thinking in the context of history and new mission planning features, you are more likely to be encountering failures as orchestrated by a mission author.

First we've had developers in the thread if it was really so simple as you say they could have laid these fears to rest right away. All we know for sure is that they are adding the functionality likely for an obvious making history related reason, but that doesn't lay to rest fears that they'll squeeze this fundamentally flawed idea back into the core game and call it a feature killing two birds with one stone hence why people raise such adamant concern.
 

2 hours ago, TheKosmonaut said:

. If camera wobble and building destruction are features that we can disable in a menu, why wouldn't part failure be?

Second I dunno why can't the kerbal class system be disabled in the menu? or the tier 1 and 2 ksc facilities be ballance modded without extensive plugins? or that the facility are able to replaced as a modder sees fit. just because squad did something right in the past doesn't mean they won't make screw ups in the future our reactions are at times all we can do to fight such screwups since we can't trust squad to be left to it own devices after 1.0
 

2 hours ago, TheKosmonaut said:

People need to stop expecting the worst.


Third we're talking about a company that sold its communities faith in them out for a console port deal with sony. I'll stop expecting the worst from squad when they go back and polish off everything that should have been done before 1.0 properly that means the placeholder art, the half baked part ballance, and the disjointed career gameplay they already have instead of just tacking things on for immediate sales at minimal investment.

Edited by passinglurker
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Apollo 13 was NOT on a free return trajectory at the time of the incident. They needed to be off the free return for their designated landing area, so after the accident they had to use the LEM for the required burns. One of the other burns was to speed the return by 10 hours (LS was clearly an issue).

Apollo 13 is not really much of a challenge in KSP unless there is life support, frankly, because there is no real time limit. Also, assuming the LEM motors work, doing the burns in KSP would be fairly trivial.

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Wow, some sweeping statements in the last page or two.

To hopefully help out on one of em the part failure mechanic is being built for the expansion and we do read all your feedback and value it. To my knowledge there is no plan to enforce part failure on people globally and if its in a mission then the creator will have decided to do that; if the part failure makes the mission suck then people wont play it and its a moot point is my take on it. I can see it being useful in many game modes, but cant give you definitive ins and outs at this point.

There's some really nice ideas in here about partial failures - some of which Ive seen chatted about already - but all good to read.

Re the staff type comments do try and keep in mind that people have weekends, so "laid these fears to rest right away" does depend on devs not taking a weekend break in this case (and its a long weekend in a few places), and for the "failure is a failure re previous dev team", I;m not quite sure where that's coming from - I've seen this on lists of things to work on for as long as Ive worked for Squad - so it really depends on which previous dev team (or dev) is being commented on there.

 

 

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Part failures: it sounds like it could add something to the game play, so I'm going to wait to see how it pans out. I tend to play KSP as a pure game/sandbox most of the time and am usually not looking for more things to 'stress' about while designing or flying a craft, but I would not mind nor oppose the addition and will probably use it to some degree.

I do hope that for general game play outside of the missions it is configurable so we have a choice. Recent 'failure' additions that have already been worked into the game (G-force limits, pressure limits, no control without comms signal, plasma blackout) all have come with an on/off toggle in the settings, so I think it is reasonable to expect the same for part failures.

 

Speaking of pressure limits: any chance of giving that a little attention as part of the mission pack/part failure feature? As in, actually giving it a point. Right now, with all parts being equally useless for high pressure environments, the single choice on/off is merely choice between being able to access the deep seas or not, so it's kind of dead at the moment. Seems a quick win to give that configuration item a once over for all parts and add some differentiation, at least (and make a few parts capable of high pressure use).

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Well that's one way of looking at it, @passinglurker. Another way that might win a lot of respect and more listening ears would be:

1) A feature is announced that I have concerns about.

2) I express my concerns.

3) I wait and see what happens

4) If it is as I feared, I try it first and then complain about it. If it isn't as I feared, I just saved myself a lot of unnecessary worry and negativity.

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6 hours ago, TriggerAu said:

There's some really nice ideas in here about partial failures

Ever since I first played Dang It, I've thought that degradation over time was a cool idea.  A part is never useless, but requires preventive maintenance from engineers.  This gives engineers more purpose, but never fully borks your ship.

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5 hours ago, Deddly said:

Well that's one way of looking at it, @passinglurker. Another way that might win a lot of respect and more listening ears would be:

1) A feature is announced that I have concerns about.

2) I express my concerns.

3) I wait and see what happens

4) If it is as I feared, I try it first and then complain about it. If it isn't as I feared, I just saved myself a lot of unnecessary worry and negativity.

Yeah that's what I did I had a concern (some one is acting to dismissive of other people's concerns) so I expressed it (by going into the reasoning and history of why people could have this concern). Now I'm in phase 3 "wait and get berated for not hugging the squad chimp hard enough"

If they do things right (either make it not part of the core game, or make it configurable/only kick in when predictable and avoidable conditions are met, and not just randomly) then yeah nothing to worry about.

EDIT: By the way if they do integrate part failures that kick in under predictable and avoidable conditions then for gameplay reasons they can't make "prolonged exposure" one of them. Giving parts limited life or breakage timers adds to the tedium as you need to fly more milk runs with replacement spaceships. Also they would need to either add more rugged variants of various parts or integrate the upgrade system into the stock balance otherwise your building options for certain missions could become quite limited.

Edited by passinglurker
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41 minutes ago, passinglurker said:

Yeah that's what I did I had a concern (some one is acting to dismissive of other people's concerns) so I expressed it (by going into the reasoning and history of why people could have this concern). Now I'm in phase 3 "wait and get berated for not hugging the squad chimp hard enough"

Are you implying I am being dismissive? You couldn't be further from the truth. I have played this game since .10 at the very least, and while I have disagreed with some of the things Squad has done w/ development and choices they've made, I also know that they do a lot of good, too (one big common bone you and I picked was the barn). I also know that a lot of other stuff that could have been forced was not. It would, frankly, be ridiculous to assume that part failures are a forced "feature" in a standard or sandbox game. I wouldn't disagree with Part Failure being forced *in* a mission, as a mission may very well need a part failure to be interesting at all. Though, I am sure the crew of Apollo 13 wouldn't have shared that sentiment! 

As for developers laying concerns to rest, it's the weekend still for some of them, the Weeklies aren't published by them personally, yeah? 

 

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A few suggestions for the localization string GC minimization (It is vary likely you are already doing these, but better to mention them than not have you consider them):
1. Have all strings as preloaded assets and only use small pointers to said strings.  (This is good for ALL string handling not just localization.)
2. When strings have contextual variants, prepack the full variants along with redundant data, don't generate them, even if this means using more memory.  (Static memory is cheap, dynamic memory is expensive.)  The package compression will remove the redundancy on disk.
3. Whenever possible use tiny pointers to the strings instead of the strings themselves. Load the string into the routine as late in processing as possible.

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Just now, Frozen_Heart said:

Surely people could just, you know, switch part failures on or off, therefore not having to be affected by them?

 

Like I plan on doing. Not going to refuse to play the game for something that will never effect me.

Yeah.. I have no plans to be going mach 2 in a fighter jet and then all of a sudden, poof! RIP Right Wing and Jebediah dies a fiery death

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