Kerbals lifting things off the ground

[Fearless Son]

There is a problem I have frequently found myself in that perhaps you have too.  Say you are landing on a surface with low-gravity, but the surface is at a slight incline, you hit it at a weird angle, and your lander tips over.  Or suppose you are in a rover on that same low-gravity environment, you get going too fast, hit an uneven part of terrain, go spinning in off the surface and land upside down.  

Well, you could just over-build all those things so that never happens or can right themselves if they do end up in that situation, but what if you have crew with you?  Why not use them?  

Something I have tried to do, but found it awkward and difficult, is to get a Kerbal under an edge of something I am trying to flip right-side up and either jumping or using an EVA pack to thrust upward, but the force imposed by them is usually hampered because it cannot get a firm purchase on the object I seek to impart that force on, often deflecting off, wasting the effort.  It struck me as a little unfortunate because crew ought to be able to use their bodies to perform mission-necessary actions: they already do that with flags, and surface samples, manually deploying solar panels, and fixing broken tires.  Why not flipping overturned components?  

This does not feel like too much.  Super-Kerbal levels of strength are not necessary if the gravity is slight, and often all that is needed is a good "nudge" so the reaction torque and RCS (if applicable) can get going.  I was thinking, a Kerbal on EVA who is firmly grounded on a surface might be able to right-click a nearby part and perform a "Lift Up" action, which would impart a small force on that specific part in a direction normal to the surface (as determined by gravity.)  This would allow clever Kerbals to figure out how to maximize the effect by selecting a part where they have good leverage from the center of mass.  If we want to go wild, maybe make this a function of Engineers who have a small jack in their toolbox (they already fix broken tires so we can deduce they have that on hand.)

Based on what I know of the engine, this should not be too complicated, but let me know if I am off-base here.

[Mr. Peabody]

Yes, kerbals are strong enough to move small parts.

[The Aziz]

The thing is, the game can't determine if the craft is flipped or not. You could crash your lander and parts could spread across the surface, yet every single one of them would count as "landed"

[pandaman]

Neat idea.

Maybe a variation on the 'Grab' function that allows a Kerbal to grip any object more efficiently could work.  When 'gripping' a Spacebar press could give a 'lift' action rather than a 'jump'.

[The_Rocketeer]

A flipped rover is already a mission gone badly wrong. I recommend driving carefully and/or accepting fate.

[Just Jim]

I build roll-cages... never really thought about using a Kerbal to flip a rover... I have to experiment with this... 

Edited December 24, 2017 by Just Jim

[Fearless Son]

On 12/23/2017 at 4:40 AM, The Aziz said:

The thing is, the game can't determine if the craft is flipped or not. You could crash your lander and parts could spread across the surface, yet every single one of them would count as "landed"

That is the thing, the game does not need to know if a craft is flipped.  All it needs to know are "Is the Kerbal on solid ground?" and "Is the Kerbal within range of the part?"  

The later thing is already in-engine, that happens all the time with interactables (repairing wheels, opening solar panels, collecting science, etc.)  The former is also in the game already, as that is what it uses to collect surface samples.

... okay, so in the process of thinking about these, my QA-engineering brain tripped and fell over a potential problem.  The in-engine determination of "Is the Kerbal on solid ground?" makes no distinction between what they are standing on in relationship to what they are interacting with.  I initially thought that this would be used when they were standing on a planetary surface, but it also applies when they are standing on a landed craft.  That is fine too, mostly, but only if the craft they are standing on does not contain the part they are trying to interact with.  If that ability to impart a small normal force could enable exploits such as a Kerbal having a little "pogo-stick" they could stand on and launch themself upward with.  But since they can already do that by jumping, I have no idea why this would be useful.  

[Gordon Fecyk]

11 hours ago, Fearless Son said:

I initially thought that this would be used when they were standing on a planetary surface, but it also applies when they are standing on a landed craft.

The "Plant Flag" function only works when motionless on a surface and not standing on a part. What about using that?

[Fearless Son]

4 hours ago, Gordon Fecyk said:

The "Plant Flag" function only works when motionless on a surface and not standing on a part. What about using that?

Good point, and it would serve as a good stopgap measure.  It feels a little incomplete though.  

Say for example a Kerbal is standing in the cargo bay and is trying to push some piece of cargo that got stuck while detaching.  That Kerbal ought to be considered "braced" (against something which is itself braced against the surface) but it would not be considered so with a simple check.  Or likewise, what if a Kerbal was standing on the wing tip of something while pushing something else.  Would the Kerbal push the wing tip down due to their position of leverage?  Etc.  

[Jas0n]

If this gets implemented, someone *cough* Danny2462 *cough* would find a way to use kerbals to throw things into orbit. 

[NSEP]

23 hours ago, Jas0n said:

If this gets implemented, someone *cough* Danny2462 *cough* would find a way to use kerbals to throw things into orbit. 

I would love to play with the configs of this feature.