[1.0.5][Dec 15, 2015] Contract Pack: Giving Aircraft a Purpose (GAP) 0.3: Air Flights, Tours, Coast Guard, STS

[nightingale]

You're going too fast, but at least you stopped raising bugs. I hope that means you're not finding any, versus waiting to raise them when I release 1.9.2.

[inigma]

5 minutes ago, nightingale said:

You're going too fast, but at least you stopped raising bugs. I hope that means you're not finding any, versus waiting to raise them when I release 1.9.2.

Not finding any more, and all the time I spent in universalizing and simplifying my code in all my contracts is paying off - making new contracts is getting much easier and faster. I've reached a point where if I get those two critical bugs (crew as tourists, and vessel/kerbal ocean floor spawn) fixed, I'm set for developing straight into a 1.0 release. Once CC #386 and CC #401 enhancements are in CC, I'll have everything I anticipate I'll need from CC for this entire project all the way to GAP 4.0.

Edited December 24, 2015 by inigma

[pTrevTrevs]

You know, I just had an idea for a type of contract you could add to this pack. What if you had sunken wrecks spawn out in the ocean, sort of like the boats for the rescue mission do, but the goal is to go down with a submarine and explore it? You could even make he contract require you to bring a piece of the shipwreck back to the surface!

[inigma]

1 minute ago, pTrevTrevs said:

You know, I just had an idea for a type of contract you could add to this pack. What if you had sunken wrecks spawn out in the ocean, sort of like the boats for the rescue mission do, but the goal is to go down with a submarine and explore it? You could even make he contract require you to bring a piece of the shipwreck back to the surface!

Yup! Already slated for next GAP release: see DEVNOTES: https://github.com/inigmatus/GAP/blob/master/DEVNOTES.txt

*IslandTours-Submarine - KSC Island Tours: Submarine Tour - Seats: 4-8

Difficulty will be in testing if spawning on ocean floor will keep debris at bottom.

[kcs123]

11 minutes ago, inigma said:

Yup! Already slated for next GAP release: see DEVNOTES: https://github.com/inigmatus/GAP/blob/master/DEVNOTES.txt

*IslandTours-Submarine - KSC Island Tours: Submarine Tour - Seats: 4-8

Difficulty will be in testing if spawning on ocean floor will keep debris at bottom.

I think that should not be a problem to create craft or part of craft that always sink to bottom of ocean. Only thing to worry about is to create craft with greater density than water. Meaning some part cliping should be necessary to put them in same volume space to create artificial density. Might even use full tanks of whatever material (fuel/ore), so once you reach submerged object you have option to discard some of weight and make craft/debris floatible again.

[inigma]

20 minutes ago, kcs123 said:

I think that should not be a problem to create craft or part of craft that always sink to bottom of ocean. Only thing to worry about is to create craft with greater density than water. Meaning some part cliping should be necessary to put them in same volume space to create artificial density. Might even use full tanks of whatever material (fuel/ore), so once you reach submerged object you have option to discard some of weight and make craft/debris floatible again.

Where there's a will...

[inigma]

Been a little busy:

 

Edited December 26, 2015 by inigma

[inigma]

Running into an issue though with testing the K2 climber rescue contract. This bird can only get up to 4777m altitude. Nothing higher. argh. I think it's a KAX limitation.

 

 

[kcs123]

I don't think that is KAX limitation - it is designed to loose thrust as you come in thin air density with altitude. In KSP 1.0.2. and also older KAX version I was able to clim up to 10km with lightweight heli. I don't know how it is currently balanced, I forgot to check/rebuild my Heli for KSP 1.0.5.

There was also other complains that heli rotor is too weak and Keptin will going to make it more powerfull in next KAX update.
There is also some older posts in KAX thread about rotor and how much thrust it should provide, you might want to search for those for more info.

[inigma]

1 hour ago, kcs123 said:

I don't think that is KAX limitation - it is designed to loose thrust as you come in thin air density with altitude. In KSP 1.0.2. and also older KAX version I was able to clim up to 10km with lightweight heli. I don't know how it is currently balanced, I forgot to check/rebuild my Heli for KSP 1.0.5.

There was also other complains that heli rotor is too weak and Keptin will going to make it more powerfull in next KAX update.
There is also some older posts in KAX thread about rotor and how much thrust it should provide, you might want to search for those for more info.

Nah its the engine. Thrust is set to 100 kN max. Setting it to about 150 fixes the issue.

[Black-Talon]

I have once again had a landing issue. I am doing the "KSC Island Landing" and after Landing (nice perfect landing on the dirt) I do not have "Land at KSC Island" marked off the objectives list.

I've finished "Claiming the island for KSC" by "walking to the base of the air tower" and "plant a flag." About to fly back to complete "Land back at KSC runway."

FWIW, I took off and landed a second time to try to complete the objective, no dice. I suppose I'll do it all again and see if I notice anything. Anyone else having trouble with landing not completing?

[inigma]

1 hour ago, Black-Talon said:

I have once again had a landing issue. I am doing the "KSC Island Landing" and after Landing (nice perfect landing on the dirt) I do not have "Land at KSC Island" marked off the objectives list.

I've finished "Claiming the island for KSC" by "walking to the base of the air tower" and "plant a flag." About to fly back to complete "Land back at KSC runway."

FWIW, I took off and landed a second time to try to complete the objective, no dice. I suppose I'll do it all again and see if I notice anything. Anyone else having trouble with landing not completing?

I duplicated. It completes when you EVA your pilot though. weird. Adding to my bug list.

Edited December 27, 2015 by inigma

[inigma]

20 hours ago, Black-Talon said:

I have once again had a landing issue. I am doing the "KSC Island Landing" and after Landing (nice perfect landing on the dirt) I do not have "Land at KSC Island" marked off the objectives list.

I've finished "Claiming the island for KSC" by "walking to the base of the air tower" and "plant a flag." About to fly back to complete "Land back at KSC runway."

FWIW, I took off and landed a second time to try to complete the objective, no dice. I suppose I'll do it all again and see if I notice anything. Anyone else having trouble with landing not completing?

Ok I tested this. Not sure what's happening. I set the waypoint for the island waypoint not to hide on completion though, and haven't been able to reproduce this. What I was able to reproduce was a new bug I discovered, in that if you have multiple GAP contracts active, since I am using the same vessel definition, landings at KSC runway are not recognized and you can't finish contracts. I will fix this by ensuring all contracts of unique craft names for vessel definitions going forward. I assume this will fix any residual issues with IslandLanding as well since before today it was not in a vessel parameter group. I will be adding vessel parameter groups to this contract. If someone is unable to complete a parameter for any other contract, let me know.

[inigma]

21 hours ago, Black-Talon said:

I have once again had a landing issue. I am doing the "KSC Island Landing" and after Landing (nice perfect landing on the dirt) I do not have "Land at KSC Island" marked off the objectives list.

I've finished "Claiming the island for KSC" by "walking to the base of the air tower" and "plant a flag." About to fly back to complete "Land back at KSC runway."

FWIW, I took off and landed a second time to try to complete the objective, no dice. I suppose I'll do it all again and see if I notice anything. Anyone else having trouble with landing not completing?

Ok, I fixed it. Waypoint was completing a cycle too soon, thus tripping the hide waypoint option, which prevented completion which was then still looking for a landing status a cycle later. I've reversed the order to check for landing first and then if player is within waypoint range, before completing the parameter permanently.  I will need to update all landing contracts with this new order for the Island Airfield - quite possible the new Aircraft Carrier contracts..

[Black-Talon]

Wow - so quick! But all of that sounds about like what I was suspecting. It seemed as though the "waypoint" completed but then the complete objective no longer could be completed for some reason.

Thanks! Excited to give the new version(s) a go soon! I'll need to start over and enjoy the ride!

[Black-Talon]

Oh! A super minor nit-pick regarding the OP of this thread. When you release the next version consider making the release .zip more easily/obviously the a download link for your pack. Unless perhaps you're expecting people to download and install it another way(?). I personally find that a quick read looking for the download link often results in me back on the Contract Configurator download, or the source download, etc; eventually I find the release .zip download as the link of the title. Thanks for this silly consideration!

[inigma]

3 hours ago, Black-Talon said:

Oh! A super minor nit-pick regarding the OP of this thread. When you release the next version consider making the release .zip more easily/obviously the a download link for your pack. Unless perhaps you're expecting people to download and install it another way(?). I personally find that a quick read looking for the download link often results in me back on the Contract Configurator download, or the source download, etc; eventually I find the release .zip download as the link of the title. Thanks for this silly consideration!

When I delete this thread and release 1.0 in Add-on Releases, I will!

[inigma]

Ok, I'm now working on developing the one actual single contract I wanted to make before I this whole thing ballooned to 34 contracts on paper, 90% of which are now done: KSC Airlines Flight 101.

The KSC Airlines charter flights require manual passenger exchange, but the reward for reaching the KSC Airlines regular flight contracts, is that regular flights require no such manual exchange (but do require a much larger passenger aircraft with full service cabins). I was thinking all along that a simple duration timer (30 seconds) would be enough to make it seem like something is actually happening with up to 84 passengers being exchanged (names won't change on the roster though, and all passengers will spawn as tourists which can't be EVA'd), but short enough not to be annoying.  Simply you fly out up to 84 tourists to the Island Airfield. Land. Wait 30 seconds. Fly back to KSC runway and park it at the runway or SPH air terminal to complete the contract and receive a monetary reward of 750 funds per passenger.

When I release GAP Beta, I'll ask you guys to help me test balance and provide ideas. I hope to also run this contract through the Community Career Framework SCORE and self-certify this as CCF compatible before we go Gold release.

[inigma]

GAP 0.5 is completed. Not for release though since it requires planned bugfixes in CC 1.9.2.

I'm now working through 0.6: https://github.com/inigmatus/GAP/milestones

Once CC 1.9.2 is released, GAP 1.0 may very well be released within a week after that. Poor nightingale though, he's sick, so I am using the time to really push my internal development for 1.0 readiness.  I'm an OCD programmer, so a lot of my time has been making on documenting the code, adding enhancements, and making it look pretty. Code is poetry. My hope is that if something were to happen to take me away from GAP, someone else could pick it up and maintain and add to it.

Edited December 28, 2015 by inigma

[Black-Talon]

On 12/28/2015 at 1:32 PM, inigma said:

The KSC Airlines charter flights require manual passenger exchange, but the reward for reaching the KSC Airlines regular flight contracts, is that regular flights require no such manual exchange (but do require a much larger passenger aircraft with full service cabins). I was thinking all along that a simple duration timer (30 seconds) would be enough to make it seem like something is actually happening with up to 84 passengers being exchanged (names won't change on the roster though, and all passengers will spawn as tourists which can't be EVA'd), but short enough not to be annoying.  Simply you fly out up to 84 tourists to the Island Airfield. Land. Wait 30 seconds. Fly back to KSC runway and park it at the runway or SPH air terminal to complete the contract and receive a monetary reward of 750 funds per passenger.

That is a pretty fantastic conclusion to these contracts! Would this require or benefit from one of those mods that adds additional airports across Kerbin? Or is that just too much to leverage additional airfields?

[inigma]

8 minutes ago, Black-Talon said:

That is a pretty fantastic conclusion to these contracts! Would this require or benefit from one of those mods that adds additional airports across Kerbin? Or is that just too much to leverage additional airfields?

Im not sure how to code for other airports, but mod authors are welcome to require a player to have completed a GAP Flight 101 contract as a hook into contracts for their own airports.

GAP 3.0 will feature contracts to build bases at KSC 2.0 and the north pole which will then unlock charters and regular flights to and from those locations. 

[kcs123]

1 hour ago, inigma said:

Im not sure how to code for other airports, but mod authors are welcome to require a player to have completed a GAP Flight 101 contract as a hook into contracts for their own airports.

GAP 3.0 will feature contracts to build bases at KSC 2.0 and the north pole which will then unlock charters and regular flights to and from those locations. 

Just beat me with this contract. I'm just puting some sidenotes what to suggest for CFF, and this one is very similar idea as I was thinking of. More of that soon in CFF thread.

[skykooler]

Bug report: I had a contract that required me to recover a Kerbal. I did so, but it wasn't marked as complete. And then I had no way of completing the contract, because the kerbal was gone.

[inigma]

12 minutes ago, skykooler said:

Bug report: I had a contract that required me to recover a Kerbal. I did so, but it wasn't marked as complete. And then I had no way of completing the contract, because the kerbal was gone.

Which contract, and where were you when you could not recover him?  Can you duplicate it?

[skykooler]

10 hours ago, inigma said:

Which contract, and where were you when you could not recover him?  Can you duplicate it?

I believe it was the Coast Guard Rescue contract, with Lt. Dan.

I've also got a few contracts with the opposite problem: I accepted a contract for flying tours. I then crashed an unrelated ship. This failed the flying contract, and as a result I've got a whole bunch of extra tourists in my roster with nowhere to go.