Forced Node attachment

[Kilmeister]

I may have posted this in the past, but I thought I'd bring it up again. There have been countless times that I've wanted to attach a part to a certain node, but the editor never seems to select the correct node, and I have often resorted to extreme zooming and partial dissasambly as other methods to finally get a part to attach to the other that I had intended.

What I suggest is a part placement mode that lets you specify which part/node you are attempting to attach another piece to. For example (The one that's inspiring me to write this post). When you select this mode via UI or hotkey, you select one of the green nodes presented in the editor, and that's the only node that the part will attach to if a connection is possible. The amount of time and frustration saved by this would be immense. The connection logic has definitely improved over time, but there is no substitution for "this is where I want it" human interaction in the editor. Most of the time, the logic for part placement is pretty sound, but sometimes you need to just need the ability to specify which node you are trying to attach to.

An extra addition to this could be "Node Fit" where only other attachment nodes would work on the selected part, and then free fit where the part could attempt to attach per it's current logic, but only to the selected part

This little rant comes after attempting multiple times to create a simple space station part in the cargo bay of an existing spaceplane design and having to reload over and over multiple times before finally quitting for now.

[aleis]

ooooo not a bad idea.

for a work around try building the service bay on a new ship then saving it as an assembly and loading that assembly to the base.

but i know your frustration.

[tomf]

Do you know that you can hold the alt key down to force a part to only attach to nodes - as opposed to radially? It won't help you pick the right node amonst many tightly spaced ones but it certainly helps narrow the placement options down.

[KrazyKrl]

Do you know that you can hold the alt key down to force a part to only attach to nodes - as opposed to radially? It won't help you pick the right node amonst many tightly spaced ones but it certainly helps narrow the placement options down.

Now just add on right-click to that Alt key; to select the node you wish (Node selected should turn yellow or something, and be cleared when alt is released.) And there ya go.

[John FX]

I like the idea.

It would be nice to not have to fight the interface to do something fairly basic like put this part on that node right there, no not that one, stop jiggling, bah still not the right node, nope, nope, nope, ah, that`s it, wait, you`re attached to the wrong side, dammit I`ll rebuild the ship and put you there first.

[CaptainTurbomuffin]

I have never encountered this problem, but if it's as bad as you say, something should be done. Anyway, if attaching a part to a specified node is so hard, wouldn't selecting the node in your suggested mode be as hard too?

[John FX]

I have never encountered this problem, but if it's as bad as you say, something should be done. Anyway, if attaching a part to a specified node is so hard, wouldn't selecting the node in your suggested mode be as hard too?

Not if KSP had a standard behaviour for when two or more objects are very close being that a right click brings up a drop down selection menu. If that were standard behaviour it would benefit the game greatly especially in map mode with close objects and various other places like trying to select a particular part in flight etc.

Also extending the [] selection method from just selecting ships in physics range to all areas of the game, for example nodes, ships in the map mode, parts on a craft and so forth.

IMHO the game could do with having the object selection method looked over and improved on a general level.