Uh, SQUAD, it's one thing if a capsule can survive re-entry, it's another if a space station can.

[Norpo]

So I ran a little test with the new atmosphere, and hyperedit. I put the station around Minmus's orbit, and just killed it's orbital velocity, and let it fall back down.

Now, the station didn't go without explosions, but nothing of vital importance actually broke; Just some clamp-o-trons and a light.

If I had parachutes, I bet the crew would have survived.

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I thought if nothing else, the crew cabins would be sheared off and just fly away, but that didn't happen.

No heatshields were used, and if you notice I even turned on the engine at one point, I re-ran the experiment without it on and only one extra light blew up. I think that an aero somewhere in-between 1.0 and 1.0.2's would be great, less soup than 1.0.2's, but making it so you can't go 1,600 m/s in the lower atmosphere.

tl;dr, make the aero less soupy, but a little more drag than 1.0's aero would be great.

(simul-posted to reddit, by me)

[Motokid600]

What if you were to turn the heating all the way up?

[tater]

Kerbin needs to be bigger.

[Norpo]

What if you were to turn the heating all the way up?

Exact same thing, surprisingly, 3 docking ports and a light.

I wish they gave the option to put it more than just 120%. (I imagine that's possible with save file editing, though)

[travis575757]

Squad, we're counting on you to fix this, please.

[EladDv]

well most of your craft was crew cabins....

[DoToH]

well most of your craft was crew cabins....

Yes.. to burn these you have to land them at Mount Doom (Mordor).

:sticktongue:

[regex]

I wish they gave the option to put it more than just 120%. (I imagine that's possible with save file editing, though)

Pretty sure it's in Physics.cfg in the root directory. If not, Settings.cfg.

And yeah, it's been toned way down.

[Der Anfang]

Kerbin needs to be bigger.

I agree completely. Things would be way more interesting if Kerbin were more similar to Earth in size.

[Starwhip]

I agree completely. Things would be way more interesting if Kerbin were more similar to Earth in size.

And consequently, a heck of a lot more *tedious*. It takes over eight minutes to get into orbit IRL.

In KSP you can do it in about 2. Much better from a gameplay aspect.

And Unity doesn't like the Kerbal universe at its present scale, bigger will give you bigger problems in physics errors.

[maccollo]

I agree completely. Things would be way more interesting if Kerbin were more similar to Earth in size.

Edited May 3, 2015 by maccollo

[tater]

Make Kerbin a little bigger for stock. Honestly, anyone who has messed with the 2X or 3.2X Kerbin sizes in 0.90 knows that it's hardly noticeable (with FAR/DRE). It's a happy middle ground, and a no-brainer to me. Regex I think calculated the right size with FAR (so likely similar with new aero) for the dv to space to be identical to stock 0.90.

[panzer1b]

I'm a rocket guy so I don't really care, but those who like to build planes probably wouldn't like such a change at all.

I'm a SSTO guy, so please no more nerfs to something that has already become far more limited then it was initially (laythe roundtrip style is dead without going into exploit territory).

Anyways, isnt this already in a mod? just go get the realistic solar system mod, and you are all set, no reason to ruin everyone else's games.

[Motokid600]

8 minutes to launch to orbit in real life, but people seem to forget this is KSP and we have time warp. You can get to orbit in RSS in just a few minutes. Once your horizontal and cruising to orbital velocity you can hit 2x, sometimes 3x time warp. Takes a real nice chunk out of the flight time.

However a 1:1 scale solar system in KSP is too much to ask for ( not for me personally I'd welcome such a thing, but I'd wager I'm in the minority ). But Squad should seriously consider scaling things up by atlesst two for starters.

[KSK]

well most of your craft was crew cabins....

Exactly. The station wasn't that big and was coming down engine first which makes a heatshield of sorts - as it did with DRE if I remember correctly. The crew compartments were spaceplane cabins - again designed for re-entry. The bits that did explode were the bits I'd expect to explode - ie the parts on the end on those girders that weren't hiding behind anything. And if the girders survived - well that's not too much of a stretch, given that large chunks of real life space stations survived re-entry too, albeit not from lunar orbit.

Not entirely sure how Squad are meant to 'fix' this to be honest. If they crank up the stock heat damage too far, all the spaceplane flyers will be screaming blue murder that they can't land anything any more. They could perhaps make the fuel tanks a bit flimsier - if there's one thing that didn't look right with that station, it was the surviving Jumbo-64. Then again, KSP fuel tanks have always been ridiculously sturdy - and I suspect that messing around with that would break so many other parts of the game that it just wouldn't be worthwhile.

[Fuzzy Dunlop]

The problem is the 1.02 drag boost means that stuff slows so fast it doesn't get a chance to cook properly. I think we need to revert to 1.0 areo then nerf the low altitude thrust of the jets to compensate.

[KSK]

I'm a SSTO guy, so please no more nerfs to something that has already become far more limited then it was initially (laythe roundtrip style is dead without going into exploit territory).

With respect, it seems a bit over the top to declare something 'far more limited' because single-stage-to-the-far-ends-of-the-solar-system no longer works.

[MalfunctionM1Ke]

Re-entry Heat cant melt Steelbeams.

[Gerandar]

Pretty sure Mir didn't break up totally when they reentered it and a big chunk of it fell over New Zealand in a field made one hell of a big boom.

[foxkill2342]

Was anyone complaining about not enough drag when 1.0 was released? Why fix something that isn't broken.

[Norpo]

Pretty sure Mir didn't break up totally when they reentered it and a big chunk of it fell over New Zealand in a field made one hell of a big boom.

True, but this is just demonstrating the weak-reentry in general, unprotected lander cans survive re-entry (which are supposedly supposed to "not survive reentry or even a sneeze"), and the atmosphere now is a little too soupy, at least in my opinion. In my opinion, if something can survive going 2000 m/s through the atmosphere, with giant things sticking out from the side, that doesn't seem right, to me at least. (I literally just stuck on long 1.25m fuel tanks to the cargo bays in my last test, the things were bending like heck but never snapped)

Was anyone complaining about not enough drag when 1.0 was released? Why fix something that isn't broken.

I think it was an attempt at:

• Making planes easier and so they didn't burn up on re-entry 50% of the time (I wouldn't claim to know anything about this as i'm not a plane person, but a lot of people are suggesting changing jets, not the atmosphere for making planes better)
  
• increasing the delta-v requirements closer to their old levels,
  
• and imo the old atmosphere felt a little too thin, which may of been what squad was thinking as well, which is why I suggest setting the atmosphere to a half-way mark, though I have no idea if that would actually work, I haven't tested it.
  

1.0.1 was a great update; it fixed a bunch of glitches (invulnerable parachutes, heatshields being physicless, just to namea few), and brought in new features (a basic fin that was needed for early career), just re-entry heat was a casualty (I can literally re-enter with just an unprotected landing can), and aero is a little too soupy. That's okay; but in my opinion it's something that needs to be looked at, either for 1.1 or for a possible 1.0.3. The game isn't "literally unplayable", or "ruined FOREVER", I won't say that, just "not perfect".

[Nobody_1707]

RSS has an option for a 6.4x sized stock Kerbol system, right? That and NuFAR ought to fix all the problems when they get released.

[Wallygator]

I wonder if this not the atmosphere but rather the heat settings on individual parts that need balancing.