[1.12.x] - Modular Kolonization System (MKS)

[DStaal]

Just now, sh1pman said:

Why didn't you put a separator between the airlock and the left karibou control module?

Why should I?  It was being sent automated, and the crew would be able to clear it when they arrived.  And the balance was actually fairly good without it.

I could have, I know.  I even briefly considered it - but it wasn't necessary, and it wouldn't really help anything.  (I'd still need someone to clear the radial attachment point from the airlock, as it doesn't have a node on the end.)  There are demolition blocks on the control modules that will let me slice them off, so there was no need.

[zabieru]

The counterargument there is that it's a lot easier to make a spacious and homelike space station than it would be to build a big, comfortable base on Eve. Enclosing more volume so you have a bit of room to stretch your legs isn't hard when it's just vacuum outside, but when it's high-pressure toxic gasses, well...

Also, there's a question of whether we're talking about kolonization bonuses in general or the 500%-gives-you-infinite-hab thing in particular. The former should absolutely apply to space stations: you don't think years of experience living in space stations will help make them more functional and habitable? The latter, maybe not. I tend to think that if people can learn to live in cities and on ships or oil rigs, it's not difficult to imagine we could learn to live on space stations too. But maybe I'm wrong!

Really, the problem here is that we can sort easily by SOI, somewhat less easily by situation (because you do run into some issues if your base does a little hop...), but the logical categories here don't break down well in those terms. It'd be nice to have one rule for everything orbital, one rule for everything landed on small airless bodies (most moons, Dres and Eeloo), and another rule for each atmosphere. And, of course, you'd want to keep Geology bonuses on a per-SOI basis, even for orbital refineries.

That's way too complicated to implement, though, I expect.

[sh1pman]

27 minutes ago, zabieru said:

I tend to think that if people can learn to live in cities and on ships or oil rigs, it's not difficult to imagine we could learn to live on space stations too. But maybe I'm wrong!

Sure, people can learn to live everywhere. But why would it make any difference if a station is orbiting Kerbin, Duna, Jool, or even Kerbol?  If you are used to living in stations, it doesn't really matter which body your station is orbiting.

[zabieru]

28 minutes ago, sh1pman said:

Sure, people can learn to live everywhere. But why would it make any difference if a station is orbiting Kerbin, Duna, Jool, or even Kerbol?  If you are used to living in stations, it doesn't really matter which body your station is orbiting.

Yep, as my next paragraph says.

[Stikkychaos]

Have i missed an important update removing flexotubes, or did i just install the mod wrong? ;___;

[dboi88]

36 minutes ago, Stikkychaos said:

Have i missed an important update removing flexotubes, or did i just install the mod wrong? ;___;

The expandable tunnels have gone but the KAS FlexOTubes are still in there.

[Space Kadet]

ok how do you disable all the new kerbal types? ive tried 2 new playthroughs and each time ive not had any additional scientists pilots or engineers i can recruit, for over a year of ingame time, so i can only fly 2 piloted ships and im not even a quarter way through the tech tree.

[Merkov]

1 minute ago, Space Kadet said:

ok how do you disable all the new kerbal types? ive tried 2 new playthroughs and each time ive not had any additional scientists pilots or engineers i can recruit, for over a year of ingame time, so i can only fly 2 piloted ships and im not even a quarter way through the tech tree.

You can recruit any kerbal type, pilots, scientists, and engineers included, through the Kolony Dashboard button from the KSC.

[dboi88]

2 minutes ago, Space Kadet said:

ok how do you disable all the new kerbal types? ive tried 2 new playthroughs and each time ive not had any additional scientists pilots or engineers i can recruit, for over a year of ingame time, so i can only fly 2 piloted ships and im not even a quarter way through the tech tree.

You can't, but you also don't need to. You can hire as many Engineers, Pilots, and Scientist you want from the Kolony Dashboard.

[Parmenio]

1 minute ago, Space Kadet said:

ok how do you disable all the new kerbal types? ive tried 2 new playthroughs and each time ive not had any additional scientists pilots or engineers i can recruit, for over a year of ingame time, so i can only fly 2 piloted ships and im not even a quarter way through the tech tree.

Recruit them using the Kolonization menu. Believe it is 250k for base professions, 10k for the specialists. 

[dboi88]

@Parmenio @Merkov We should start our own broadband company, with customer service like this we'd be number 1 in no time  

[Space Kadet]

Just now, dboi88 said:

You can't, but you also don't need to. You can hire as many Engineers, Pilots, and Scientist you want from the Kolony Dashboard.

yeah i know that bit , but that dosent help early on when recruiting them in the complex cost 69k instead of 250. but all thats in there is farmers, and i havent unlocked any colony parts yet, not even the 3 man command pod.

[Parmenio]

8 minutes ago, Space Kadet said:

yeah i know that bit , but that dosent help early on when recruiting them in the complex cost 69k instead of 250. but all thats in there is farmers, and i havent unlocked any colony parts yet, not even the 3 man command pod.

My advice would be just do randoms until you get what you want, and, if you feel like you're losing money unnecessarily that way, refund yourself through the cheat system. 

[Wyzard]

51 minutes ago, Parmenio said:

My advice would be just do randoms until you get what you want

I think RoverDude said earlier that the "random" button only gets you the new professions, not pilots/scientists/engineers.  I might be mistaken, though.

[GiveMeABreak]

27 minutes ago, Wyzard said:

I think RoverDude said earlier that the "random" button only gets you the new professions, not pilots/scientists/engineers.  I might be mistaken, though.

You can get the base professions (pilot, engineer, scientist) from random recruiting. 

[sh1pman]

34 minutes ago, Space Kadet said:

yeah i know that bit , but that dosent help early on when recruiting them in the complex cost 69k instead of 250. but all thats in there is farmers, and i havent unlocked any colony parts yet, not even the 3 man command pod

Just do some contracts. Or you can mine and sell exotic resources, just like Roverdude did in one of his streams. 

1. Mine a resource lode.

2. Send some containers and load the stuff into them with local logistics.

3. Send the freighter back to KSC.

I usually make around 400k per trip.

Edited January 26, 2017 by sh1pman

[DStaal]

1 hour ago, sh1pman said:

Just do some contracts. Or you can mine and sell exotic resources, just like Roverdude did in one of his streams. 

1. Mine a resource lode.

2. Send some containers and load the stuff into them with local logistics.

3. Send the freighter back to KSC.

I usually make around 400k per trip.

Without any colony parts, he can't find the lodes in the first place.  What he needs is *science*, not funds.

RoverDude, is there any way to restrict the new professions showing up until you're a certain amount through the tech tree?  A starting space program shouldn't be even considering Kolonists - it's not ready for that yet.

[sh1pman]

Just now, DStaal said:

Without any colony parts, he can't find the lodes in the first place.  What he needs is *science*, not funds.

RoverDude, is there any way to restrict the new professions showing up until you're a certain amount through the tech tree?  A starting space program shouldn't be even considering Kolonists - it's not ready for that yet.

Oh, I forgot that you need a Pioneer module to find lodes. Well, then he should just farm some science from the Mun to unlock the colony bits.

[voicey99]

Would it be more or less efficient to use larger resource drills over smaller ones? Right now it's looking like smaller drills are better-consider the table:

Drill	Cost	Mass	EC Usage	Production
ME-100	250	0.278t	10/s	1/s
ME-500	1300 (5.2x prev tier)	1.6t (6x)	40/s (4x)	2/s (2x)
ISM	6000 (4.6x)	8.332t (5x)	360/s (9x)	6/2 (3x)

As you can see, production does not scale with the negative aspects of the drill, meaning it is significantly more efficient in all areas to use ME-100s for all mining operations requiring more than a dribble of resources (since the larger drills have more configurable bays). Even so, it it still more efficient in all aspects to ship three individually configured ME-100s to produce each of their three resources than it is to ship a single multi-resource ME-500. Beyond ease of use and partcount, the larger drills seem very underpowered (for example, 6 lowly '100s will produce as much as an ISM while costing 1/4 as much, weighing 1/5 as much and using 1/6 the power)-as such, I can't see any practical reason to to use them over an equivalent array of ME-100s (unless there's some mechanic that balances them I'm not aware of?).

P.S. the costs of the Tundra PDU and Pioneer are still broken (the entirety of the 17.3k PDU cost comes from the enriched uranium it ships with, and the Pioneer is negative when emptied of machinery).

[jd284]

Actually in terms of mass and production, all three drills scale perfectly.

Drill	Production per bit	Bits	Total	Mass
MEU-100	1x	1	1x	0.278 (1x)
MEU-500	2x	3	6x	1.666 (6x)
ISM	6x	5	30x	8.332 (30x)

So they actually all scale perfectly for mass, EC usage and production rate, whereas for cost the bigger ones are (relatively) cheaper.

[edit] Forgot to put there that the EC usage is 10, 20 and 60 per drill bit exactly matching its production.

[jd284]

[edit2] Looking over it again, it seem like you just had the wrong number of bits for the larger drills. That would definitely make them seem underpowered.

[voicey99]

So the given production values in the VAB are per bit, not per drill? That would make sense, though it could be perhaps a little more obvious to someone who is used to the vanilla drills (where the stated production values are for the drill as a whole).

[RoverDude]

More thread catchup

I've seen a lot of orbital stations using the ground (Ranger) parts.  Curious why folks do that vs. using the newer Tundra inflatables...

@dboi88- the Osprey (my Eagle clone) will have swappable pods.  Tho day one it will probably just be the Ground Construction workshop.

@Tyko- No plans for a Tundra science lab since Tundra modules are pretty stock alike and blend well with the stock one.  But not opposed with a Github issue.  Also, log a github issue if you want some surface-mount windows

@jd284 - remember there are no bespoke IVAs for MKS (yet), so transparent pods would not be very useful.

@dlrk - Tundra bits are great for surface bases, and pretty similar to some of the new surface base concepts from NASA.

@Gilph - if you are still having issues and have not done so already, a Github issue with a save is what I need to sort stuff like this.

@WuphonsReach - Log a github issue if you want more nodes, or if @dboi88 can do a PR, all the better

@Stratickus- the Kolonization and Logistics tabs are managed by manufacturer

@baldamundo - which module is giving you grief?  Basically you're missing the USI-LS converters hence the index issue (tho I thought this was sorted before... apparently not)

@DStaal - RE the mini hab, sure.  It should really have a new texture (logging a github issue will help me not forget!)

@Omnipius - you might have the multi-hub upside down.  The +0.6 node is for 3.75's.  The +0 node is for 2.5's, and the -0.4 node is for Ranger-style parts.

@jd284 - There are some upcoming updates to the 'Kolonized' status.

@DStaal- RE Kolonists, I am going to look and see if I can do a more intelligent default for their price.

Also, at this point I plan on doing a release next weekend.  So now is a good time to log issues and toss PRs

[DStaal]

13 minutes ago, RoverDude said:

@DStaal- RE Kolonists, I am going to look and see if I can do a more intelligent default for their price.

The price isn't really the problem that was being discussed, though it might help.  The problem is that people are seeing Kolonists, Farmers, Technicians, etc. trying to sign up for their beginning space program, when they still really need Scientists, Pilots, and Engineers.     Hiring direct isn't really the same, as you can't look at their stats first.  (And I think pricing isn't equal, as IIRC each Kerbal costs more to hire than the last in Career, though I haven't actually played that mode much.)

[RoverDude]

27 minutes ago, DStaal said:

The price isn't really the problem that was being discussed, though it might help.  The problem is that people are seeing Kolonists, Farmers, Technicians, etc. trying to sign up for their beginning space program, when they still really need Scientists, Pilots, and Engineers.     Hiring direct isn't really the same, as you can't look at their stats first.  (And I think pricing isn't equal, as IIRC each Kerbal costs more to hire than the last in Career, though I haven't actually played that mode much.)

Sure, but assuming they can just hire from the Kolonization dashboard, if the price for a pilot was the same as a default new hire in the AC (with a cap of 250K) that should solve the issue

(I may ping @TheReadPanda and see if I can borrow his astronaut complex code - tho my concern with anything that modifies the AC is conflicts)

Edited January 26, 2017 by RoverDude