GluttonyReaper

To be honest, I'm not entirely sure the devs even know what's being added beyond scope completion. Although it would be nice to know what exactly they believe falls under that category, I think the biggest issue is that Squad doesn't really want to deal with the complaints of people wanting their specific features in the game. I suppose it's far easier to just not tell the community - people can't complain about features not being considered if they don't know if they are being considered or not (although, to be fair, they do it anyway. ) Then again, I can see such a list being very handy for modders - Extra EVA not even being considered for future updates? Better make a mod for it then. Although, again, seeing updates being planned for the future may discourage modders from adding features in the vein of "It's going to be stock anyway, so why bother?" Or perhaps the exact opposite, I don't really know. It's all quite confusing, especially with Squad choosing to reveal certain features, namely multiplayer (I suspect that may have been a way of softening the blow of resources being shelved though). And I'm still not sure how it would affect the marketing side of things. Do people like being randomly given features they weren't expecting? Or would they prefer to know a long time beforehand?

I think that's beside the point. Forgetting what the diagram entails, it is what is being suggested here (at least, I think it is - feel free to correct me), which is an idea of what was being planned in the future. The useful thing about this is that we can get a clear idea of the effects of releasing future plans, what with the reactions of the community being somewhere in this forum (this was after the April events, right?). As such, it means won't have to guess to the pros and cons - we can look at what has happened previously.

No, it's just ... terrible. From the tests I did on Kerbin, where I attempted to use cubic struts and static panels to create power for a very low weight gain, the game just lags horribly, to about 10 seconds per frame, even though I'm only using ~350 parts. I think that it has something to be with the physics-less nature of the parts. Seeing as I was only using seven ions in my tests, and far more would be necessary to achieve Eve SSTO, I doubt KSP could deal with a suitable craft.

Oops. I think I actually set up an action group for the the intakes, I just forgot to mention them. Thanks for the advice with the control surfaces. Updating craft file now.

I'm fairly neutral on this matter, but I thought it would be worth bringing up that this appears to be an approach that Squad has attempted before, disclaimer and all: And it's certainly true that many users were ... less than happy when none of this chart ended up applying, complaining about "broken promises", or whatever. Whether or not such a thing is acceptable or not, both to Squad and the community, is what I'm assuming is the cause of debate here.

Craft File: http://www./download/haet62hxtq3ydwu/Heavy+SSTO.craft Weight at launch: 26.61 tons Dry weight: 12.49 tons Part count: 58 Physical dimensions: Quite Large Action Groups: 1 to switch RAPIER engines' modes / 2 to toggle intakes. 100% stock, no mods used. Holds 5 kerbals. Probably not FAR or DRE compatible. Use at own risk. Not certified for flight outside of LKO without refueling. Landing without engine thrust is steep - do not be afraid! The craft will remain (mostly) intact on landing, as long as vertical speed is kept below 15m/s.

Does that really solve the issue? I always assumed it was the number of parts being simulated with physics than wouldn't otherwise, rather than the size directly causing performance issues.

No! Don't you understand what you've done!? Just by guessing at a release date, you've extended the development time! Now it will take at least 11 days for 0.24 to be released.

Not necessarily. Remember, a stage could quite easily be (and likely would be) made of different parts, with different impact tolerances. Also, the terrain it lands on is quite important as well - land on a slope, and it's entirely possible that the whole stage would fall over, if physics was still being simulated on it, destroying some of the parts on the top, perhaps. Similarly, landing in water is a very different experience to landing on dry land, as the effects of lithobreaking are no longer a thing. The actual landing site of the stage is also somewhat required - distance from KSC determines recover value. Without fully simulating physics, the stock game has no way of getting all the data it needs to generate an accurate recovery value, making this less trivial than it seems.

I don't think that's quite as significant as you think it is. From what I remember, Unity likes to have random minor updates, which I'm guessing is what's happened here. Of course, I could be wrong...

Nah, they're pretty fun to build:

You can, but bear in mind nuclear engines are rather heavy. Adding extra engines can significantly reduce dV, depending on the craft, as mass does affect dV.

Voted for Phobos mission. I figure, if we can somehow get the additional funding and a free launch, we may as well try for something no-one else has achieved yet, rather than just another generic mission that doesn't really tell us anything we don't already know. Science for reals, guys! EDIT from the far, far future: In hindsight, this wouldn't really be feasible at all, don't really know what I was thinking. Phobos still would have been cool, though.

Exactly. In any case, it's probably not a good idea to introduce any new planets right now. Doing so would probably be quite nice in the short-term (yay, new planets!) but in the end, would just be delaying features that actually add to the gameplay. I believe (although I could be wrong) that one of the devs mentioned that it was a quality over quantity ideology, and that more planets would be kinda pointless until the current ones actually had more stuff (biomes?, better landscapes?) to do on them. EDIT: Not what I was looking for, but relevant: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/entries/303-A-rant-about-development-asymptotes#comments

Anything that moves more than 2.5km away from the active craft is automatically deleted, regardless of parachutage. Whether or not this will be taken into account for First Contract is yet to be confirmed. My personal guess is that it won't be a thing though, as it has been stated that the vessel recovery system is currently only in its first iteration.

Weren't new tutorials supposed to be a thing?

Just wanting to point out a common issue that seems to have cropped up on the few servers that I've poked around: debris and abandoned craft generally are everywhere around the KSC, creating huge amounts of lag. This obviously isn't a huge issue, seeing as generally you don't spend much time around there, but it would be nice to have some rules in place about that.

Indeed! It's not that big a deal yet, but around Jool, solar panels only produce about half the electric charge as they do around Kerbin. Presumably, once Squad adds some more planets further out, this will be far more problematic. Oh, and if you were wondering, that efficiency doesn't actually do anything yet, so don't worry about that.

RTGs produce power continuously, although less than solar panels around Kerbin. They are generally useful for unmanned craft, just giving them enough juice to never run out and go offline. Just put one on and it should work.

Consider me in for this. Like many others, I've never used multiplayer before, but this is a definitely a good starting point. Does KMP give any server tools or anything like that? If so, it might be possible to just roll back the server a few hours and revert any damage done.

Yeah, this is basically my stance on the matter. As much as mods allow you to customize the difficulty to an extent, it is a pain to keep everything updated. I don't really see any drawbacks from implementing them stock (although not actually just copying the code from the mods - the problems with that are detailed here). Although, as I mentioned in my last post, I doubt we'll be seeing any of these any time soon, seeing as Squad are currently trying to get the game "feature-complete" - a lot of these things are just polish really, and the placeholders we have now are probably going to be around for a while. Of course, I'm not a game developer, or even a coder, so I don't really know what I'm talking about.

I agree with you on a lot of points here, but I can see some issues with this kind of approach. The main problem being that believability (for lack of a better word) is entirely subjective. While you and I may consider pancake rockets to be totally absurd, for example, to a lot of people, that might not be the case. And that's what makes this so difficult to balance. I guarantee that there have been plenty of people playing KSP who just thrusted, straight up, into space - and were confused when they fell back down to Kerbin. In that way, being realistic may even stop the game being believable for some people. But, overall, I do agree with you. Even though we are playing a game with little green men who occasionally die of shock, the link to reality in the form of believability is what makes KSP what it is. Without it, it's just some fun little game that might entertain you for a few hours. But, having that link allows the game to work on so many different levels - from MOAR BOOSTERS to hardcore pen-and-paper orbital mechanics. And I feel the ease with which the game can be modded exists mostly for this purpose. Are more realistic aerodynamics believable for you? Then download FAR. Want to design your rockets perfectly for the task at hand? Kerbal Engineer. So, in summary, I wouldn't worry about this too much. The way I see it, the game has only been getting more and more believable with time, both through stock development and mods. Chances are, the career and multiplayer mode stuff might put it all on hold for a bit, but I doubt it will be forgotten.

HarvesteR posted something about this which you might find interesting: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/79071-Devnote-Tuesdays-The-0-24-Experimentals-Edition/page7

I believe the third thing is science.

Just wanted to say that I've thoroughly enjoyed this series, and can't wait to see what you've got in store for the future.