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[0.90] Lazor System v35 (Dec 17)


Romfarer

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I can raise and lower the landing legs, activate the SAS and make it turn in any direction you want as well. I just cant flip the RCS switch on! =P I have tried to force pump rcs fuel into the things and more but i think it is reading the rcs lock from a global variable i just cant access. Once i hit R i can use the rcs blocks just fine, i just want a button in my program so the user don\'t have to hit R.

Edit...so yes, once i have the RCS light on...i can use the other vessels rcs independently.

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It sounds like you have the dream addon for many people here, if you can use SAS and rotation controls on another ship to hold it steady during rendezvous you\'ll have solved a major problem people have had with docking.

It\'ll be better than Mechjeb :)

@Kreuzung, what?, Romfarer\'s Lazer can let you use another crafts RSC if you want to, that is not a small thing, and adding the ability to turn on it\'s SAS (and ASAS with it) is just great.

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He talked about activationg RCS automatically, which can be useful, but also sometimes not. Maybe even add a possibility to suppress RCS on your own craft, as MechJeb rather fires all thrusters instead of none.

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Well this morning i was launching rockets while being safely positioned in my test vehicle 100 meters away. Then when the rocket got in the air i would trigger self destruct on them, then i would LOL :D so next alpha you will be able to do this too.

The thing with the rcs is just a user experience thing. I can\'t assume that the user knows the RCS is global. So if the user cant see the option on the interface, most users will not think that it is possible to use RCS on the other craft. But if they just hit R they will get rcs on all crafts. I\'ll just work on the assumption that they know that, in any case it should work fine to hold a craft steady without rcs.

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Romfarer wants to activate RCS via his control panel, instead of having to press 'R', it won\'t activate automatically, but I think I know what you mean, you want the RCS on your own craft kept off right? So Mechjeb doesn\'t waste all your fuel while you are trying to maneuver the other ship?

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Romfarer wants to activate RCS via his control panel, instead of having to press 'R', it won\'t activate automatically, but I think I know what you mean, you want the RCS on your own craft kept off right? So Mechjeb doesn\'t waste all your fuel while you are trying to maneuver the other ship?

EXACTLY!

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Yes i\'m gonna teleport a few crafts up into orbit later on when i\'m done writing this SAS thing.

The basic version of this will be able to advance stages, set throttle, set direction and stabilize the craft with sas. Maybe some of those things will require additional blue lazors later and maybe more features will be added too.

That\'s a cool idea to remote control the tiny rover btw. In theory it is possible to have several tiny rovers driving around on ground scanning stuff, all controlled by a satellite.

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One of my plans for when docking is introduced is to build a mothership with several landers attached, I could make something like that now and just use Mechjeb to control each lander, but remote control would be so much cooler.

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screenshot62r.png

I got the stabilizer working, it will now stabilize the targeted craft making it stand still. Or if you press the prograde or retrograde buttons it will stabilize it in a prograde or retrograde position. It\'s not SAS per-se because when you hit the stabilize button the craft will spin back to the stabilize position no matter how far you try to tilt it off course.

I think this should suffice for the single blue lazor remote-control system. Anything else you can think of?

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That\'s already fantastic, but when I get more ideas for you I\'ll definitely tell you :)

Hopefully in future when KSP has more features like multiplayer, the communications Lazor could allow for simulating secure laser communication between two ships.

Another thing that might be useful would be a scanning Lazor that can list all the parts, fuel levels and states of things like landing legs on remote ships, this mode would be handy when managing remote craft without having to switch to them just to see if they have enough fuel left.

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I just uploaded the latest build (alpha2-4) and i\'m looking forward to hear what you think about the remote control system. If nothing else you got to try this: Position yourself somewhere off the landing pad in a cart. Then load up a rocket consisting of several parts. Then switch to your cart and remote control the rocket on the pad. Launch it and then press S-D and watch the fireworks ;D

I\'d also appreciate suggestions as to what the other colors should do. I have more or less decided that the green one will have a scan function and the white one will be something generic, perhaps manual scanning and targeting. But nothing is 100% decided yet.

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Okay I\'ll try this later today, I think the white beam should be just scanning and targeting as well, as it\'s a pretty fundamental function that must be performed before any other effects can be used, maybe the white beam can give you the distance to the target as well while green can give you other info like it\'s parts, fuel levels, orbital characteristics (similar to Mechjeb but for remote targets) and stuff like that.

Perhaps the Lazor should allow remote control of debris as well, if you ever played Independence War you\'d have seen the REM mode where you could remote control other craft if their command module was missing, the debris would need a SAS or something so you can steer it though.

Personally I think the Lazor should be more of a tool than a weapon like Tosh\'s laser, but there\'s no reason why the Lazor shouldn\'t also have destructive abilities, I\'ll see if I can think of a way to make the Lazor more distinctive though.

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Right now the remote control should work just as well even if the target vessel don\'t have a command pod. The stabilizing system will also work even if no SAS module is present, on either vessel. Some restrictions should probably be added to that later on.

As for destructive abilities the S-D button is the most efficient destructive system in the game =P it requires a tracking station link-up though. So i have no plans of adding a damaging lazor to the system, tosh\'s laser is already perfect for that so i rather add an option to attach it to the system.

I\'ve been working on mouse control for the lazor system. This thing is almost too efficient and it almost rendered LIDAR completely useless. So basically the green lazor will now be scanning in mouse-lock mode and everything you aim the green lazor at will be added to the target list. For the red lazor i\'m working on a marking system where you can mark locations on kerbin and the mun which will show up on the target list and on the map so you can for example, track the monoliths, landing sites or whatever.

What information would be useful in the scanning system?

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Well currently you\'d want info pertinent to what you are scanning, if you are trying to dock you\'d want relative velocities and inclination for example, as well as distance.

Maybe an ability to scan the terrain below or in front of you could show info such as true height above ground, and slope angle if any, making landing less dangerous.

I believe that later we\'ll need a system to scan other planets for atmospheric composition, surface features, temperature and similar, and those metrics will be somewhere in the game for each planet and moon, the Lazor would be the ideal system to scan for these things when they are added to the game.

You are right that the Lazor is almost godlike in it\'s ability currently, which is great as an unlockable developer mode, but to help with immersion the system will have to be toned down a bit, not made hard to use though, but there does need to be limits to it\'s power, I do agree though that mouse control of the beam would be a good thing, it\'d be a lot faster and more intuitive as well.

Finding Munoliths would be useful but also can potentially remove the fun of finding them if it\'s too easy to do, perhaps the Lazor shouldn\'t pinpoint their location with much accuracy, implementing a fuzzy targeting system now would also save work later if alien ruins are added to KSP.

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Finding Munoliths would be useful but also can potentially remove the fun of finding them if it\'s too easy to do, perhaps the Lazor shouldn\'t pinpoint their location with much accuracy, implementing a fuzzy targeting system now would also save work later if alien ruins are added to KSP.

I meant it\'s a marking system, it don\'t find anything it just marks locations so you can find your way back.

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Okay I\'m testing the Lazor now, my suggestion for the white beam is to keep it simple :) show the targeted vessel name, think of it as the Lazor getting the other ships transponder signal so it knows what it has targeted, and maybe the white beam should have the ability to get the distance to the target (and ground), this would be much like the current pink marker we see but would be part of the Lazor panel so wouldn\'t disappear when close, and would be more useful than the grey marker we see on debris.

This way it\'s not totally dependent on having other colours, and a simple Lazor setup with just the white beam would be useful as a very basic rendezvous and landing aid, this would be good for experienced pilots who only need a few simple tools (distance readout) from time to time and mostly fly by hand and eye.

I think those two abilities plus the targeting ability are all the white beam needs, also I like that the beam intensity changes with set range.

The green scanning beam currently shows distance, maybe if distance is a basic part of the white beam it\'ll be visible on every subsequent mode?

Things that are useful to know about a target should all go into the green mode, such as it\'s altitude, speed, heading and capabilities, maybe the info should be less accurate with distance? That would make it harder to control rovers from orbit but would also help make the system more immersive, you\'d be more inclined to close the distance so you get good readings, lasers are known for operating over very long distances though, maybe later when weather is added the Lazor might be affected by clouds.

Also, one green beam might only give you the info when the scan button is pressed, while three might allow for continuous real-time scanning of the target, also later it would be good if a check is made to see how many Lazors are actually hitting the target.

The blue beam looks well set up, and later when there are cameras added to KSP, the blue beam could gather the image data from the targets cameras (by communicating with the target), letting us see what the rocket or rover can see, this would be great for remote probe exploration.

I tested the blue beam on one ship that was almost 100% mods and with another that was 100% stock, both craft failed to get off the pad, I was able to activate and control it\'s engines though, with both craft there was no activity with remote SAS activated, engine thrust ceased and stages could not be advanced.

No ideas for the red Lazor yet, I\'ll put my output log here so you can see the Lazor was working, I have no idea why the ships didn\'t launch, also the decouplers fired but some parts that were off the ground did not fall, that launchpad was 333.6m away from the Lazor test craft.

I tested activating the engines and then switching to the stock craft via the Lazors 'Fly' command, it had used some fuel as normal and I was able to launch it, just not remotely.

I\'m playing on a Linux PC using Wine to run KSP, so maybe my system isn\'t compatible? I had some issues with older Mechjeb also, but the current version works fine.

Edit: Forgot to mention the text that pops up when selecting buttons, that\'s a really good feature and made using the Lazor much easier, thanks.

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I tested the blue beam on one ship that was almost 100% mods and with another that was 100% stock, both craft failed to get off the pad, I was able to activate and control it\'s engines though, with both craft there was no activity with remote SAS activated, engine thrust ceased and stages could not be advanced.

I tested activating the engines and then switching to the stock craft via the Lazors 'Fly' command, it had used some fuel as normal and I was able to launch it, just not remotely.

I think what\'s happening is you are using a multi-stage rocket with several liquid fuel engines. Thing is i have to do a work around to remote control vessels and it makes things a lot more complicated. Hopefully it will not be too tricky to fix that issue, in the mean time if you want to give remote controlled launch another go i suggest using a simple craft.

I appreciate the comments.

Edit: Could you please attach the stock craft you couldn\'t get off the pad?

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The new patch introduced some changes to the Part class and this broke the lazor system. So i uploaded a 0.15 compatible version. It\'s also a preview of the mouse-look feature. I also added some hotkeys to this so you can activate mouse look by pressing 'v' and change the lead lazor color by pressing 'b'. And now there is also a test scenario in the bundle with two crafts orbiting Kerbin, 10 meter apart.

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