Design by part-count

[Thegamer211]

I try to keep my part count low.

I mostly wait for 1.1 though. I lag like heck when controlling my space station, and get crashes from no ram.(and still have lots of mods I want to install in 1.1)

[Cairol]

Which "indicator" is meant in the poll?

[DMSP]

I clicked I don't mind the yellow instead of I limit my parts.

My computer is a potato.

[panzer1b]

"I limit my parts to keep my game play smooth."

More like:

"I limit my parts to keep my game from crashing."

Anyways, my biggest killer is trying to do fleet ops with 4+ capitals loaded at once along with 2 squadrons of fighters per side. Given that a single missile is on average 6-10 parts, that gives at a bare minimum ~150 parts of just weapons PER SHIP (600 parts around for 4 capitals, can be less with lowered weapons counts or simpler warheads, still at least 400). Hulls for capital ships vary from 130-200 parts, so lets say 4 of the smallest hulls, thats another 500 parts right there. Fighters are at least 10-15 part hulls, and at least 2 simple missiles, so ~25 parts per craft (and this is a very simple mk1 pod+2 missiles+1 engine setup).

You can see my major issue with part count right here, i cannot make capital ships below ~250 parts each without sacrificing armor or weapons, and i need at a bare minimum ~25 parts per fighter (not counting heavier more advanced fighters that are ~50-70 parts total). Basically if i want to have 2 vs 2 capitals, and say a rather low amount of 4 fighter per side, thats at a bare minimum 1200 parts for 2 small strike groups fighting each other. In 0.90 this was playable, in 1.04, hell no, lag above 1000 parts is unbearable, and i refuse to limit myself to 1 vs 1 as its kinda boring and increases the factor of luck (usually whoever fires 1st wins the whole battle).

~1500 parts is teh max i can even load without having crashing issues, and really 1000 becomes unbearable lagfest (makes it hard to interact with anything). Im just HOPING U5 helps somewhat. Im not asking for over 9000 parts being lag-free, but if i could perhaps have ~1500 before the lag kills my ability to do stuff, itd make KSP so much more enjoyable.

[monstah]

I tried building gloriously big stations before, but no more. I keep my FPS on yellow, and it's difficult to!

- - - Updated - - -

Voted for I Dont Care About Lag for the reason that I once had a launch take me two hours twenty minutes in real time to get to orbit.

I'd think anyone else was insane if they said this, but being you I take it for granted...

[eataTREE]

Oh yes, I'm having this problem big-time.

I'm pretty good at keeping the part count of an individual vehicle down to a reasonable sub-300-parts level. My problem is that I design a 300-part cool interplanetary spaceship, then a 300-part lander, a couple of 300-part rovers, and a probe or two, and dock them all together, whereupon the simulation speed slows down to about five seconds per second. Compounding the problem, my current 1000+ part beast is also my first "science fiction tech" craft (fusion drive from KSP Interstellar). It is designed to fly very fast, direct, high-energy, time-optimized transfers, which means burn times of an hour or more. And an hour in Kerbal time is five hours' worth of mine -- from the crew's point of view, they get around in a hurry, but from mine, everything takes way, way, way longer!

After a week of real-life time and one completed maneuver per day, I have finally established orbit around Tekto (a moon of Sarnus, from the Outer Planets mod). I can't wait to get my Kerbals into one of the landing vehicles and to get that lander out of physics range, so that KSP stops looking like a slide show.

Anybody ever landed on Tekto? I figure the low gravity + thick atmo ought to make it pretty easy, but space is littered with the debris of those who assumed things were going to be easy...

[I_Killed_Jeb]

I view it as part of the design challenge to use the minimum number of parts for an aesthetically pleasing and mission capable craft. And challenges are what breeds creativity for me.

[SciMan]

I voted for "So long as it stays yellow", but really I limit myself to ~15fps high orbit/interplanetary, 10fps low orbit, 5fps atmosphere (if counting RL:Game time ratios instead, replace 15fps with near-realtime, 10fps with 2s RL = 1s game, and 5fps with 5s RL = 1s game).

I'm using KSP Interstellar Extended, and I quickly determined that it's not even the physics that's making the game lag. Nor is it the new thermal system, but that certainly doesn't help.

Of course, most of the reason I'm using KSPI-E in the first place is that it lets me cut down on part count for interplanetary travel. Kinda self-defeating, but it's still a net benefit. (50 part motherships instead of 100).

My limits are encountered at roughly 150-200 parts. Used to be 275-300+. I miss those days.

I think the problem is that the resource code, physics code, and thermal code all are run on the same physical core. If they could use separate cores, my quad-core processor would be able to run the game much better.

And that's WITHOUT the "difficult" things like PhysX multi-threading or making multiple cores work on a single problem.

It's just a better way of sharing the not-so-closely-linked problems.

I'm almost certain it's both more complex than I think, and less complex than making 2 CPU cores work on one ship's physics calculations.

Hopefully the need to rewrite the UI from the ground up will mean getting rid of a bunch of old, laggy code. Hopefully that includes the resource system.

IIRC the resource system runs thru all the parts on a ship MORE THAN ONCE PER FRAME. I can't even describe how inefficient that is.

A start would be "Taking an M1 abrams to work, and work is 100m away".

Edited September 25, 2015 by SciMan

[Warzouz]

I don't build too big stations. But the interplanertary stage + LKO stage may put them at 350 parts (especially to Moho). Going to LKO may be a pain. but thinkgs get better next.

On Beta 0.9, I made the error to send a space station to Laythe in piecies. 13 flight assembled there. Ending part count : 900 ! KAS to the rescue to remove all thos useless RCS packs, solar panels, small engines... Part count went to 600 which was better. The station had 1 return ship, 6 landers (most were SSTO) and 6 orange tanks.

I didn't try to reload the station in 1.0.4. The new engine ISP and aero wouldn't allow the Laythe and Tylo lander to work.

[Bekiekutmoar]

My vessels rarely exceed 150 parts. Timer gets yellow when over 120-150 parts but the game is still very playable then.

[Torquemadus]

I play Career Mode. I don't build really huge lag inducing megastations because I've never had an operational need to do so.

I used to tolerate being "in the yellow" on my old laptop. However, my old laptop was "in the yellow" pretty much all the time regardless of part count!

[quasarrgames]

There should really be an "i will do almost ANYTHING to reduce lag" option.

Seriously. With 1.0, anything over 100 parts is just too laggy to have fun with. I've had to cut corners like you wouldn't believe. Cutting out reaction wheels, control surfaces, RCS, solar panels, airbrakes! Sometimes i'll spend several hours with my creations against a grindstone trying to grind off whatever parts aren't absolutely necessary for aesthetics or function.

You guys and your "boo hoo i can only use 500 parts!", you ain't experienced nothing.

[Sidereus]

I try to keep partcounts under 100 in order to keep my FPS "reasonable" (i.e., over 4).

I almost never have a green timer, unless my partcount is under 30 or so.

Edited September 26, 2015 by Sidereus

[NeatCrown]

Where's the "I can only have 20 parts without lag so I don't have a choice" option?