basic.syntax

But... will you consider re-tuning crash tolerances? I'd be much more likely to engineer a landing protection assembly for Mammoth powered "landers" if the new range was up to a more risky 10 m/s maximum. The VAB is half of the game Right now its so easy to just "wing it" with landing on the heavy engines. (Which in a way, I suppose is "very Kerbal.")

While I'd also like to see some larger legs, I'm not sure that is something Squad should focus on, given how far into fantasy land we go, with super heavy designs. Thus far, Squad has left sci-fi stuff up to the modders, but I don't count out the possibility they'd 'go there' in a future expansion (pun?). Multiple MPL's can generate tons and tons of science points in career mode, we need more toys to spend it on. Stock parts have no reasonable-looking answer imo, for a "lander" which uses the Mammoth, probably because the idea is real-life ridiculous. But to lift off EVE with an MPL, For Science!, or to fulfill nutty ore transport contracts, you need to carefully transport and land something massive.

Thanks so much for writing up a rationale for the changes - please don't stop I'd like to ask generally, why does high crash tolerance exist for larger engines. I regularly omit landing legs on larger designs with 20m/s crash tolerant engines, and that seems wrong. Engine bells should not support the weight of a rocket I would like to see a proportional rebalance of all crash tolerances, to a scale of 1 - 10 m/s maximum.

Making an orange texture for the 2.5m nose cone would be a welcome and fairly easy step.... but... to take it to an extreme, I would like to see new geometry as well. Check out this profile comparison:

pinging @StylusHead The tapered black stripe on the small nose cones say... "look at meee!" - I feel that's the most distracting element. Overall they are really "busy" looking with the extra paneling lines. Another vote for a solid orange 2.5m nose cone - the "orange" 2.5m tank was put in to echo the Space Shuttle external tank, but we don't yet have a proper orange nose cone for it.

Kerbal characters are cartoon-style fantasy characters, but they live in a semi-realistic world. But players are very particular that engine sizes should look "believable." Its just too late to have this discussion; the new design is completed.

Why A vac (vacuum) engine bell (nozzle) has a certain size - an "expansion ratio" - if the nozzle is too small, it can't produce as much thrust as you would expect it to produce. It would look wrong if it was too small. They have spent many hours making a 2-nozzle poodle, they aren't starting over, at this point!

Nice IVA! I'm liking the surface sample manipulator arm cabinet on the side, that was a real tight squeeze It would be neat if we could interact with things like that in IVA's, to activate some animations For Science!

I'm a little lost in this interpretation: in the first career contracts we're quite limited in kerbal abilities, part count, assembled dimensions, and part selection. I don't feel very free, compared to Sandbox mode with everything enabled. But "the selection of parts in this level of career-mode can be freely assembled any way you like —" is that what you mean to highlight as the same in all modes?

"sandbox" is one of the game modes... please don't forget Career mode. And providing players with options. Doesn't having this much info up front set a precedent with respect to the rest of the details that Career Mode locks away, behind Kerbal skills and KSC upgrades? Should (for example) fixing flat tires and repacking parachutes also be opened up in career-mode for any Kerbal? I think these features are more important "later" in game progression terms, when the challenge of completing contracts to the far planets and moons really begs for the extra info and Kerbal abilities; compared to reaching the Mun, where most players will overbuild and don't have to wait long to find out if they're going to make it or not. Give the dV number, but at the least, I would unlock the detailed per-stage info panel based on engineer skill or a tracking station upgrade.

RIP "Shmelta-V" 2015 - 2018. We can no longer poke fun at you. I've said in the past - just because Squad won't say yes or no, in some very long passionate/heated threads on this subject - doesn't mean it would not happen Perhaps even original KSP developer HarvesteR will be on the fence about this addition, since some days he thought he wanted it, but other days he favored keeping the mystery (which was the final word until now.) Is Delta-V display an option? How will it work in Career mode? (Original concepts suggested unlocking increasing level of detail, by Engineer skill level.)

This is one of the times everyone salutes removing something from KSP Someday... animation for taking off helmet? They have no place to stow it, perhaps they just drop the helmet, and it becomes un-recoverable debris, like payload fairing fragments. They would have to board any crew-able compartment, to get another helmet.

Thanks @RoverDude for staying on in the trenches, despite the occasional slings and arrows. Good to see @NovaSilisko posting again!

Unexpected for sure - KSP would be a dry physics-lite simulator, without the Kerbal characters putting life into it. Thanks Squad! Consider some variations for the placement of VAB scene Kerbals. The fixed position ones have been rooted to the same spot, lined up too-perfectly, for years now

I think trying to come up with a new game mode, like Making History's mission creator and its heavily scripted scenarios, is the most likely direction for a future expansion: every active mod and part maker has been putting out their take on air and space parts. Lately (as in "years") they've improved performance on and under water, that is one direction I'd like to see, as a possible focus IF it included new gameplay with some kind of aquatic exploration / research. EVE has very special oceans which should require some new high temp/pressure parts to explore. Flora? Fauna? Not much of that going on any of the worlds right now. And then there's the Kerbal Great Underground Empire, tho I don't think they'd appreciate our (theoretical future expansion) excavation and boring machines tearing the place up. (I don't know if players altering terrain would be possible with the current game engine.) You CAN see down, if you put your head right on the lower window glass.

+1 for the MK2 Lander Can revisions! All the design upgrades, and optional side storage helps justify the old mass value. (I'm under the impression it may be getting lighter? If so, I don't think it needs it, considering the additional utility.) I've used them to help contain the height of some designs, so ... not always in a fairing Agree with everything else, tho. The structural ribs are important to preserve in any revision, tho some of the contrasting paint choices cause the ribs to call too much attention to themselves, I wish for a one-color white/orange/aluminum set of options like some others have asked. I might wish for an aerodynamic / smooth design option as well, (would be thicker once the ribs were sandwiched beneath a top sheet of aluminum) but that may be too much to ask in this go-around Also yes please. This part is also a structural adapter, but one that covers up all the internal ribbing it must have, agree I'd like to see some hints of that in the texture. This part is a "smooth / aerodynamic variant" in contrast to the FL-A5 etc, which don't have one. (yet?)

Great post - goes to prove the meme that I literally know nothing about the true variety of rocket designs in the world "except what I learned in KSP." At first I wanted to argue that if KSP were to adopt a chronological progression "look" to the career-mode tech tree, it should start with heavily detailed fuel tanks and engines. Parts unlocked later should look sleeker. (The NASA parts, pre-overhaul) But here we have two rockets, both designed in the 50's and 60's, where one is smooth-sided. If I had to pick just one, I would feel bad, since I've long advocated that the "used oil drum" aesthetic has a worthy place in KSP design. But now KSP has texture and mesh variant switching, enabling alternate design styles for the same tank and engine sizes.

See what happens, Squad? You update one part, or six, and suddenly they want ALL the parts to be updated

Too many rivets. (Bolts!)

Yay! Very nice, great range of options! I like the faint arrows, very Kerbal. Would like to see lore-friendly maker's names or logos on parts, where appropriate.

Tho I would not mind to see the window frames get beefed up a little, Perhaps Kerbals have discovered "transparent aluminum?" Kudos for rethinking this part in such detail, and giving it new utility. This is far from a simple "reskin"

@Darth Badie, @nestor - The Steam store page for KSP has a Day of the Dead / Halloween -themed picture, that may be wallpaper-worthy. But its really tiny. Can we have a link to the highres version? Perhaps it could be added to the official website wallpaper collection (along with any other neat images that have been produced since the official site was last touched.) Thank you

I miss 'em too, but, some folks complained that the dev's various writing styles and grammar were a problem. Or that person X had so little to say that week, that reinstalling Windows was somehow worth noting. It always gets quiet in the month or two after a release, I've wanted to see them move to a monthly news cycle.

Among various bug fixes (which many players appreciate, even as some may wish Squad would halt all development because new things can bring new bugs) we're getting a parts overhaul. It's a larger objective, that probably won't be completed in v1.5 So ... incremental steps towards the goal of bringing all the parts up to a similar standard, which was first announced Aug 10 and every weekly update since then

Thanks for that link ... he answers a lot of KSP questions. Reading it is like catching up with a friend you haven't seen for years.