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Improved descriptions for several stock parts


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  1. I LOVE this game
  2. I LOVE that there is a vibrant, active community that provides help, mods, ideas, etc.

Notwithstanding, I feel like the game could be more welcoming to new players, especially the sort of people that don't want to turn to google to figure out how to use that cool new part they just unlocked. I feel like there are some parts that could use a little retooling in their part description in order to give the player a better idea of what the part was intended for and how to use it. Also, I get that the funny flavor text in the descriptions is a fun quirk of the game that plays into the overall feel of the game (and I like it!), but it often gets in the way of communicating what the part does. Below are some specific examples of what I mean:

  • S1 SRB-KD25k "Kickback" Solid Fuel Booster - The description here talks about it being designed to be recovered. This is misleading. As a beginner, I was really confused about how that was supposed to work...
  • Kerbodyne KE-1 "Mastodon" Liquid Fuel Engine - The description touts this engine as a "behemoth", and the pinnacle of power...huh? it's neither the biggest, strongest, most efficient, heaviest....what? My guess is that this engine shines when clustered with the new "Engine Plates"? Dunno. The description leaves everything up to imagination, and trial and error. Without dV readouts, that is probably beyond the average player?
  • The Not-Rockomax Micronode - The description (and even the name itself) makes reference to the Rockomax Multi-Point Connector, and I get that it's (sorta?) funny, but I feel like there'd be value in clarifying that it is simply a smaller (and squarier) version of a structural piece with connection nodes on all 6 sides instead of 2. And while we're on this topic, I've built a lot of crap and never used one of these, because cubic octagonal struts work just as well (often better), for a small fraction of the mass. So, what's this part good for??
  • SP-R06 through SP-R25 - Given the way the thumbnail image looks, it'd be nice if the description clearly indicated that these are equilateral triangles of varying sizes.
  • SP-T06 through SP-T25 - Given the way the thumbnail image looks, it'd be nice if the description clearly indicated that these are right triangles of varying sizes.
  • Small Hardpoint & Structural Pylon - 1) Why are these parts not categorized under "Couplers"? 2) Why are these two parts named completely differently, despite being different only in size?
  • SPS-06 through SP-S25 vs. M-1x1 & M-2x2 - I guess it's cool that we got "better" parts in the expansion, but why are the new square plates half the weight of the old ones? Nothing in the description offers any guess as to why one might choose the M-1x1 or M-2x2
  • Inflatable Airlock - What is this for? My thought is that compared to structural tubes with regular docking ports, I guess they make light and aerodynamic connectors for surface bases or orbital stations? I don't get it. As far as I can tell, it only docks with other Inflatable Airlocks, and it doesn't do any sort of flexing to aid with surface docking...I feel like the description here should offer an idea for a use case...?
  • Aerodynamic Nose Cone vs. Advanced Nose Cone - Type A - Nothing in the description makes it clear if the Advanced Nose Cone - Type A is supposed to be a clear upgrade for the Aerodynamic Nose Cone, i.e. is the aerodynamic improvement worth more than twice the mass? Even figuring that out for Kerbin alone would be a painstaking chore.
  • Protective Rocket Nose Cone Mk7 - This thing is heavy, and it's unclear whether using it is advantageous or not. I honestly don't know the answer to that. I often use it for aesthetics, but I've never been sure if that resulted in a net loss of dV for a launch from Kerbin. Am I the only one that wonders these things?
  • Engine Nacelle vs. Engine Pre-cooler - Again, it's really unclear which of these is better, or if there are factors that make the answer "neither". Furthermore, and even more frustratingly, it's completely unclear whether these are supposed to be "better" than simply using the other air intakes. The description is silent on the details...
  • Air Intakes, in general - What the heck is effective base speed? Is higher better? Why? Intake Area? Amount? Mass? It's completely unclear how to appropriately design air intake based on the information provided in the SPH.
  • Rovemax Model S2 - The description on the S2 here seems off, considering that you unlock it way before the M1.
  • Wheels, in general - In the advanced tweakables, Friction Control and Traction Control...Can we get tooltips for tweakables, or something? It's not clear how these ones work unless you do a bunch of experimentation (or googling).
  • Radiator Panels vs. Thermal Control Systems - It's obvious that TCSs turn to keep the sun off of them, but what is less clear is whether being in direct sunlight makes a Radiator Panel less effective or completely ineffective. A little help with the virtues or drawbacks of these two types of parts would really help in deciding which one to use.
  • HG-5 High Gain Antenna - Based on the description, one gathers that this is a very special antenna because it is both direct AND relay. This is the only stock antenna that says anything along these lines. However, the "Antenna Type" is listed as simply "Relay". It would be nice to clear up that discrepancy.
  • Crew Cabins, in general - the Mk1 and MK2 (casing problem?) crew cabins are both .5t per kerbal. The Mk3 is better at .4t per kerbal. And then we have the PPD-10 Hitchhiker Storage Container (which is the most commonly desired shape, by far, for me) at a lousy .625t per kerbal. I can't fathom why this would be. There's no benefit that I'm aware of that would explain or offset the extra mass of the PPD-10...what gives?

There are probably several more opportunities for improvement. I gleaned this list during a single run through the parts list as I jotted down the ones that jumped out at me. I realize that these are really nitpicky things, but I imagine that they're also really simple to address...? Of course, if things are the way they are by design, fine, I could live with that, but it'd be easier with a little explanation ;)

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9 hours ago, ariscol said:

S1 SRB-KD25k "Kickback" Solid Fuel Booster - The description here talks about it being designed to be recovered. This is misleading. As a beginner, I was really confused about how that was supposed to work...

Yeah... I think this is symptomatic of a general issue with the parts descriptions.  From a design perspective:  if you've got a big free-form text box where you can say whatever you want about a part, you've got a couple of options.  You can write "in character" (i.e. as if you're a kerbal writing about a "real" product on Kerbin)... or you can write from the player's perspective, i.e. a simple matter-of-fact description of how the part works, any gotchas, etc.

The former is "cuter" and adds more "color" to the game.  The latter is of more practical use to the player.  But really, they're apples and oranges-- they serve very different purposes.

I think where KSP kinda runs into awkwardness is that it sort of tries to have its cake and eat it, too:  they've written everything in the role-playing "color" mode... but they also try to provide some sort of practical indication, and the player can't easily tell which is which, in a lot of cases.  That's what bit you, here-- there was a bit of "fluff" writing that has no bearing whatsoever on the game or on how the part actually works, but you couldn't tell that from context and therefore it was really confusing.

Personally, I wish they'd made it clearer.  Perhaps not ditch the fluff entirely (I think it's part of KSP's charm)... but at least design the "part panel" interface to clearly designate two panels.  One would hold the "fluffy" writing; the other (which might be empty) would be the clear, practical, this-is-how-it-works info.  This would make it obvious to the player "any info located in this panel is important to you, anything over there is just for funsies."

9 hours ago, ariscol said:

Kerbodyne KE-1 "Mastodon" Liquid Fuel Engine - The description touts this engine as a "behemoth", and the pinnacle of power...huh? it's neither the biggest, strongest, most efficient, heaviest....what?

Yeah, this one kinda gripes me, too.  Other than being mesh-switchable so that it's possible to cluster them, it's basically just a Mainsail with stats scaled to about 80%, and a ludicrously jacked-up-price.  Okay, and it looks cooler, no argument there.  :)

Given that the Mainsail, 1. exists, and 2. has been a go-to staple of KSP players for half a decade or more... it's a fact of life.  So adding a part that doesn't really give significantly different playability options, and (in gameplay terms) is arguably inferior to an existing part... the balance really feels out of whack on this one.

I suppose one could argue that the Mainsail is overpowered?  I dunno, seems fine to me.  But whether it is or it isn't "overpowered"... it's there, and so it largely renders the Mastodon moot.  I think that either they need to adjust the Mastodon to make it more attractive (greatly boost the power, or else greatly reduce the price)... or, if they're trying to get at an overall parts rebalance, they'd need to nerf the Mainsail.  (Not that I'm advocating for the latter.  I like it how it is.  I think they should raise the Mastodon's thrust by about 25%, and cut its price so it's only, say, 50% more expensive than a Mainsail.)

9 hours ago, ariscol said:

"Engine Plates"? Dunno. The description leaves everything up to imagination, and trial and error. Without dV readouts, that is probably beyond the average player?

Engine plates are great, and serve a valuable function in the game-- have wanted something like this since forever.  Here's where the lack of practical nuts-and-bolts description can confuse a new player.  They're super useful, but they're also rather specialized and there are some important things to understand about how they work.  Can be hard to figure out from scratch.

I'm kinda confused by the "dV" reference, though.  What does dV have anything to do with engine plates?

 

9 hours ago, ariscol said:

Inflatable Airlock - What is this for? My thought is that compared to structural tubes with regular docking ports, I guess they make light and aerodynamic connectors for surface bases or orbital stations? I don't get it. As far as I can tell, it only docks with other Inflatable Airlocks, and it doesn't do any sort of flexing to aid with surface docking...I feel like the description here should offer an idea for a use case...?

Yeah, this one's not only a victim of KSP's "heavy on color, light on explanation" chatty descriptions of parts, but also Making History's frankly somewhat conflicted design, IMO.

  • Is it there to give people historical replicas of IRL spacecraft?
  • Or is it there to provide new playability options for KSP players?

Those are divergent goals.  I like Making History (bought it, enjoy it, have no regrets)... but I do think that it somewhat suffers by trying to do both of these things at once, which causes some ensuing awkwardness.

The inflatable airlock is a case in point.  It's not useless... but its usefulness is small enough that I do kinda have to question whether the effort that went into it might have been better spent elsewhere.

But that's about practicality.  From the standpoint of being a historical replica, there's a clear motivation there:  they're trying to replicate the inflatable airlock from the Soviet Voskhod spacecraft.  And I gotta say, looking at pictures, they got the look-and-feel pretty well.  Unfortunately, here's where they kinda get bitten by the discrepancy between "try to be historical" versus "try to be useful in-game".  There's no actual need for an "inflatable airlock" in the context of the IRL original, since every KSP pod has its own built-in airlock (and, indeed, putting this thing on top of a pod hatch will block the hatch and make it unusable).  And their desire to describe it as an "airlock" (because that's what the IRL original was) can very easily confuse players.

I've seen a lot of players posting in confusion about this part.

To be clear:  It does have its uses.

It's just a standard 0.625m docking port, when inflated:  it can dock to other inflatables, and also to the stock Clamp-O-Tron Junior.  This is one frequent source of player confusion:  it's actually a 0.625m docking port, but it looks like a 1.25m part, so players try to dock a regular Clamp-O-Tron and don't realize why it's not working.  If Squad had been designing the part purely from a standpoint of practicality, they could have made the appearance a lot less ambiguous... except that they were constrained by wanting to try to match the visual style of the Soviet contraption, which muddies the waters.

Aside from being a small docking port, when inflated it also is a pod, with a capacity of one kerbal, and a hatch.  So it can provide the ability for a kerbal to get in and out at that location.

9 hours ago, ariscol said:

Protective Rocket Nose Cone Mk7 - This thing is heavy, and it's unclear whether using it is advantageous or not.

It helps.  Nosecones matter, by reducing drag-- they're way better than having a flat surface facing the airflow.  How much they help, though, depends on rocket design, notably the overall size, and launchpad TWR.  Streamlining matters more for high-TWR ships.

9 hours ago, ariscol said:

Radiator Panels vs. Thermal Control Systems - It's obvious that TCSs turn to keep the sun off of them, but what is less clear is whether being in direct sunlight makes a Radiator Panel less effective or completely ineffective. A little help with the virtues or drawbacks of these two types of parts would really help in deciding which one to use.

They work pretty much like real-world radiators (with some simplifications for gameplay).  They radiate.  If they happen to be in sunlight, then they will absorb heat just like any other object would.  So it's better for them to be edge-on to the sun if possible, since that reduces the area exposed to sun.

In other words:  the amount of heat they dump is basically the same regardless of sunshine.  They amount of heat they absorb is a function of, 1. are they in sun or shadow? 2. how bright is the sunshine?  3. how much surface area is exposed to the sun?  If you're really close to the sun and don't have the auto-rotating panels, then radiators can actually hurt you by exposing more area to sunlight, unless you take the trouble to manually turn your craft to keep them edge-on.

9 hours ago, ariscol said:

HG-5 High Gain Antenna - Based on the description, one gathers that this is a very special antenna because it is both direct AND relay. This is the only stock antenna that says anything along these lines. However, the "Antenna Type" is listed as simply "Relay". It would be nice to clear up that discrepancy.

There are two types of antennas in KSP:  "direct" and "relay".

  • The so-called "direct" antennas can only transmit their own stuff.  They can't relay a signal from other craft.
  • The "relay" antennas can do everything the "direct" antennas can... and they can also relay a signal from other craft.

Therefore, there's no such thing as an antenna having "both ways".  Every relay antenna can also do direct transmission.  There's no such thing in the game as a "relay-only" antenna that can't do direct.

Therefore, when the "Antenna Type" says "direct", it's absolutely correct.

This is another case of "fluffy descriptions" confusing the player.  There's nothing at all even slightly special about the HG-5; it's just a tier-2 relay antenna, pure and simple.

I long ago developed the knee-jerk habit of completely ignoring the "description" field of all the parts, because most of them contain no practical information, and often they say things for "color" purposes that mislead the player by implying gameplay significance that doesn't exist.

However, dedicated UI fields like "Antenna Type" are absolutely trustworthy (and what I always focus on), since they're populated programmatically from the part's functionality, and therefore always say what the thing actually does.

9 hours ago, ariscol said:

Crew Cabins, in general - the Mk1 and MK2 (casing problem?) crew cabins are both .5t per kerbal. The Mk3 is better at .4t per kerbal. And then we have the PPD-10 Hitchhiker Storage Container (which is the most commonly desired shape, by far, for me) at a lousy .625t per kerbal. I can't fathom why this would be. There's no benefit that I'm aware of that would explain or offset the extra mass of the PPD-10...what gives?

Backwards compatibility, and balance issues over time as new parts are gradually added over the course of multiple KSP versions, are what gives.

The PPD-10 came first, early in the history of KSP, and became a mainstay of KSP players with its current stats.

Originally, KSP didn't exactly have a plethora of airplane parts.  Certainly, they didn't have a lot as of KSP 0.23.5, which is when I started playing the game.  Over the course of many KSP updates after that... KSP kept adding airplane parts and airplane parts and more airplane parts, with virtually nothing for us poor rocket folks.  And to add insult to injury... the new airplane parts often had better stats than the corresponding rocket parts.  Speaking as a formerly disgruntled rocket jockey (now a lot happier), "argh, they're coddling the spaceplane people!"  ;)

The Mk2 cabin is purely an airplane part.  The Mk1 cabin is usable on a rocket... but the visual styling of the part and its IVA clearly is intended to be airplane-like.  When they added these new parts, they made them lighter per-kerbal than the venerable Hitchhiker pod... but they didn't alter the Hitchhiker's stats to match.

I dunno whether that was an oversight, or whether it was deliberately done so as not to alter the behavior of players' existing spacecraft.  In any case... I confess this has long bugged me, myself.

 

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1 hour ago, Snark said:

Engine plates are great, and serve a valuable function in the game-- have wanted something like this since forever.  Here's where the lack of practical nuts-and-bolts description can confuse a new player.  They're super useful, but they're also rather specialized and there are some important things to understand about how they work.  Can be hard to figure out from scratch.

I'm kinda confused by the "dV" reference, though.  What does dV have anything to do with engine plates?

You were kinda confused when I mentioned engine plates. I love engine plates, the idea is great, and their use is fairly intuitive. When I mentioned them, it was just in context of the mastodon engine, and I was just expressing that using the mastodon with engine plates is the only reason I could imagine why someone might ever use that engine at all. Basically the same thing you pointed out in your comments about that engine. The dV reference is just pointing out that it might be hard to know how whether it's actually better to cluster 5 Mastodons or just go with the mammoth, or 4 Mainsails or whatever. You have a description that says this engine is awesome, but it's not easy without dV readouts to tell whether that is the case. You can easily look the 1:1 and realize that it's not great, but what if I cluster 5 of them on an engine plate...is that useful? It'd be hard to say without knowing the dV. The description definitely doesn't guide you through any of this, and that's my real complaint.

I loved your comments, BTW, some of them were very instructive, and everything was very constructive. I really like the idea of having two spots for text (flavor text goes here, and player instructions go there). This is not a novel idea, in fact, I have played a few games that do this.

Edited by ariscol
I forgot to address the dV comment
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5 hours ago, ariscol said:

The dV reference is just pointing out that it might be hard to know how whether it's actually better to cluster 5 Mastodons or just go with the mammoth, or 4 Mainsails or whatever. You have a description that says this engine is awesome, but it's not easy without dV readouts to tell whether that is the case. You can easily look the 1:1 and realize that it's not great, but what if I cluster 5 of them on an engine plate...is that useful? It'd be hard to say without knowing the dV.

...And sure, that's a great point (player wanting to know "how many of which things should I use")... except that that has nothing to do with dV, and a dV readout wouldn't help that problem.

[EDIT] Remainder of discussion moved to spoiler section, as it's somewhat tangential to the thread's topic at this point.

Spoiler

If you're considering engine alternative A versus engine alternative B, wondering "which will give more dV" basically just boils down to "which one has higher Isp".  That's basically it.  If engine A has better Isp than engine B, then engine A has more dV than engine B does.

(Yes, that's oversimplifying-- slightly.  For example, engine mass matters, because engines are dead weight and being more massive will negatively impact dV.  But engines are usually only a pretty small percentage of total ship mass, and the TWR of various engines doesn't vary that much for the most part, so Isp tends to dominate.)

And a dV tool would certainly not help you make the decision "do I need 4 Mastodons, or 5?"  Because they all have the same Isp as each other.  Any dV tool will always tell you that you get slightly more dV with 4 engines than 5, because they're lighter and less dead weight equals more dV.

And in any case, the crucial decision point there is TWR, at least when lifting off the launchpad.  I've got a rocket of a certain mass, so I'll need a certain amount of oomph to hit the desired TWR.  And that's simply a function of adding up the thrusts.  Engine A is 3000 kN, engine B is 1000 kN, so having three of B is about equivalent to one of A.  Yes, there's some math there, but, 1. it's much simpler than dV calculations, and 2. it has nothing to do with dV.

In short:  I could have a dV readout, and it could tell me "put just one Mastodon on, instead of 5!  moar dV!" ... even if that lone Mastodon wouldn't have enough oomph to even lift off the launchpad.  In other words, the dV readout in that context would be, 1. useless, and 2. potentially very misleading and lead to wrong engineering decisions.  Because dV is not what matters, there.

If you want to argue about "KSP should have a dV readout", that's certainly a valid concern.  :)  But it's also an entirely separate topic-- it's not a slam dunk, people have been arguing about that one for years and there are people on both sides of the issue.  (I happen to be firmly on the "prefer not to have one" side, myself, but I realize other people have different preferences.)  I don't see it as being germane to this topic here, as a dV readout wouldn't really help for this particular decision point.

And in any case... "how much of which kind of engine" is one of the eternal KSP questions and applies to basically every rocket ever launched regardless of which parts it's made out of, even if no engine plates are involved at all.

 

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@Snark I think you're both missing and making the point. Increasing TWR with 5 boosters instead of 4 is pointless if you no longer have enough dV to reach mission destination due to added dry mass, but if it doesn't it's clearly benefit. Designing peak performance depends on knowing how your TWR/dV balance looks, and the only most user-friendly way to know that from the editor is with a dV readout.

Edited by The_Rocketeer
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3 hours ago, The_Rocketeer said:

@Snark I think you're both missing and making the point. Increasing TWR with 5 boosters instead of 4 is pointless if you no longer have enough dV to reach mission destination due to added dry mass, but if it doesn't it's clearly benefit. Designing peak performance depends on knowing how your TWR/dV balance looks, and the only most user-friendly way to know that from the editor is with a dV readout.

Oh, I get the idea, I simply happen to disagree with it.  ;)

[EDIT] Remainder of discussion moved to spoiler, as this is only tangentially related to the topic of the thread.  Perhaps a topic better suited elsewhere.  :)

Spoiler

Mission success/failure is a complex beast in KSP.  Things can go "wrong" (as in "mission does not accomplish objective") in a variety of ways.

"Do I put 4 Mastodons on it, or 5?" is a potential failure scenario.  (Depending on mission design and how big the safety margin is, it may or may not "matter", i.e. the decision might not be the difference between success and failure.)  Let's assume that it does matter, and your mission is toast if you choose wrong.  The question is, how does it matter?  Put another way... if you choose wrong and the mission fails thereby, what is likely to be the way that it fails?

Yes, "it fails because of insufficient dV because the one extra engine added just enough weight to reduce the dV a smidgeon below the minimum viability point" is certainly possible.  However, my experience has been that it's more of an edge case, and that it's much more likely to be a failure scenario of TWR.  It's a whole lot easier, in my experience, to flunk a mission because it doesn't have quite enough engine power at liftoff, than to flunk because it has a little too much dead weight on it.  It's the later stages that make most of the difference to net dV, anyway.

In short:  if a player is relying on a dV readout to answer this question, then they'll likely fail because they're not looking at the most important things for that particular decision.  Knowing about dV is important, sure, but "how many engines do I put on my launchpad booster stage" is only loosely coupled to calculated dV.  Other factors predominate.

If we were having this discussion about an upper stage (e.g. the one used to eject from LKO to Duna, or whatever), then yes, it's more about dV than TWR and I would agree with you.  But that's not folks generally use Mastodons for.  We're talking about launchpad liftoff, here.

 

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Ya'll are hijacking the thread...The point of the thread, the real suggestion here is:

4 hours ago, ariscol said:

I really like the idea of having two spots for text (flavor text goes here, and player instructions go there). This is not a novel idea, in fact, I have played a few games that do this.

Some parts have flavor text that is highly misleading or just plain wrong because it's "in character", and some parts are sorely missing some good help text about how and when to use them. The idea above is one way to fix it. Simply tweaking the existing item description is another even simpler approach.

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1 hour ago, ariscol said:

Ya'll are hijacking the thread...

Touché, sir.  :blush:  Quite right, thank you for the nudge.  I've used spoilers to tidy up the last couple of my posts so they're not so cluttery.  Thanks for being patient.  :)

1 hour ago, ariscol said:

Some parts have flavor text that is highly misleading or just plain wrong because it's "in character", and some parts are sorely missing some good help text about how and when to use them. The idea above is one way to fix it. Simply tweaking the existing item description is another even simpler approach.

Yet another approach would be to allow a part definition to have an optional field which is a KSPedia link.  I love that there's a KSPedia feature built into the game, but I think it's under-used and has the potential to be way cooler than it is.

Basically, by default, a part wouldn't have such a link.  If it does have one, it would show up in compact form somewhere on the part panel, just a small visibly-clickable bit of text with a KSPedia icon next to it (e.g. rendered to look like a hyperlink).  The text of the link would be whatever the title of the KSPedia page is.

That would make it super flexible.  Some parts-- perhaps even most-- wouldn't use the feature at all.  Some parts might have a specialized KSPedia page just for the one part (I could picture the big science lab having one, for example).  Other parts could have multiple parts sharing the same KSPedia page, e.g. "Engine Plates".

Since the content would be outside of the part pane in the editor, it conserves screen real estate-- just a small spot to put the link with its title.  And since it's in KSPedia, the content could be as simple or as rich as desired-- anything from a simple paragraph or two of explanation up to a full-page spread with illustrations, tables, diagrams, whatever.

If that were a standard feature applied in consistent fashion, it would make things easy for the user:  treat all text in the description pane as fluff.  If there's no KSPedia link displayed, it's useful negative information-- tells the user "this part is self-evidently obvious and works exactly like you'd expect, no special knowledge needed."  If there is a link, then the user knows that any special knowledge will be found right there.

We've got this fantastic tool sitting right there-- why not use it?  :)

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6 hours ago, HebaruSan said:

For what it's worth, mods have been created to improve the descriptions

Oh, man this is just a perfect microcosm for this game.

So many people who love this game and have awesome ideas and put significant time and effort into fixing/adding/improving. I mean, the community should be proud, and it shows that the developers really struck gold with their game idea.

On the other hand, to the community, it feels like the devs are so hopelessly buried in bugs, new features, problems, and suggestions, that, if not for the community's help, nothing would ever get done...

Anyway, I appreciate the tip on the mods, and the plug to give them a hand. If nothing else, it's nice that we have the option of solving our own problems.

Edited by ariscol
grammar pedant
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  • 3 months later...

Many of the part descriptions are misleading, and I don't see how the "in character" style of writing is any excuse for that.  The flavor text is no less (and no more) amusing if it is based on the actual features of in-game parts.  

I made a pass through the base game parts (no DLC) and replaced the text I found misleading or confusing (in 90 part-descriptions) in a config-file  here, and also on the bug tracker at 20443

Localization {
	en-us {
//		#autoLOC_500124 = FAT-455 Aeroplane Tail Fin
//		#autoLOC_500125 = Large conventional wing with built-in control surface.
		#autoLOC_500125 = Large fin with built-in control surface. Warranty void if used at near-orbital speed.

//		#autoLOC_500127 = Advanced Canard
//		#autoLOC_500128 = Our engineers thought this design looked "high tech" and therefore must be clear improvement on earlier models.
		#autoLOC_500128 = Our engineers thought this design looked "high tech" and therefore must be clear improvement over the standard canard. When asked what exactly is improved, they looked at the ground and mumbled

//		#autoLOC_500133 = Swept Wings
//		#autoLOC_500134 = A prototype swept back wing, part of our "Let's Fly", line. Made of light weight composite materials. Guaranteed to generate lift, not guaranteed to ensure crew safety.
		#autoLOC_500134 = White Owl's swept wings might provide only half the lift of the boring C7 wings of the same mass, but they look much cooler.

//		#autoLOC_500769 = Structural Pylon
//		#autoLOC_500770 = A structural Pylon for engine Support. Designed to fit against fuselages, and hull bodies. Comes Equipped with emergency bolts to separate jet engines in the event of fire or catastrophic failure. (Not covered by warranty)
		#autoLOC_500770 = Attaches parts radially. Upon staging, separates from its parent with moderate force.  After serveral cease-and-desist letters from O.M.B. Demolition Enterprises, this is no longer marketed as a 'decoupler', but we don't mind how you use them.
}}

 

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I totally agree on the Engine Nacelle, Precooler and Air Intake points. What are their uses? How does Air intake area or speed relate to the amount of mass of air pulled in by the intake? It would far more efficient to build aircraft or spaceplanes if I knew how all of this worked, but I don’t, so I slap a shock cone intake on all spaceplanes, which works, but is serious overkill and rather heavy. 

I would also like a better explanation of Intake Air mass and how does that factor into the flameout Situation.

Also personally, i don’t find much use for TCS - I slap on radiators on the parts I need to cool and the tcs looks ugly and just out of the main body of the craft all the time. Also, they’re generally overkill or too weak.

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 7/24/2018 at 6:53 PM, Snark said:

it's actually a 0.625m docking port, but it looks like a 1.25m part

 

PART
{
    name = InflatableAirlock
    module = Part
    author = RoverDude
    MODEL
    {
        model = SquadExpansion/MakingHistory/Parts/Coupling/Assets/InflatableAirlock
    }
    rescaleFactor = 1
    node_stack_bottom = 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, -1.0, 0.0, 1
    node_attach = 0.0, 0.08, 0.0, 0.0, -1.0, 0.0, 1
    TechRequired = advMetalworks
    entryCost = 8400
    cost = 400
    category = Coupling
    subcategory = 0
    manufacturer = #autoLOC_501627  //#autoLOC_501627 = Jebediah Kerman's Junkyard and Spacecraft Parts Co
    title = #autoLOC_8310003   //#autoLOC_8310003 = Inflatable Airlock
    description = #autoLOC_8310004   //#autoLOC_8310004 = Description Creation Pending
    attachRules = 1,1,0,0,0
    mass = 0.1
    dragModelType = default
    maximum_drag = 0.25
    minimum_drag = 0.25
    angularDrag = 0.5
    crashTolerance = 10
    maxTemp = 2600 // = 3400
    thermalMassModifier = 6.0 // like a nose cone
    emissiveConstant = 0.8
    bulkheadProfiles = size0
    CrewCapacity = 0
    tags = #autoLOC_8310005   //#autoLOC_8310005 = berth capture connect couple dock fasten join moor shield socket

    stagingIcon = DECOUPLER_VERT

    MODULE
    {
        name = ModuleDockingNode
        deployAnimationController = 1
        nodeType = size1
        staged = False
        stagingEnabled = False
    }
    INTERNAL
    {
        name = Airlock_IVA
    }    
    MODULE
    {
        name = ModuleAnimateGeneric
        CrewCapacity = 1
        animationName = AirlockDeploy
        actionGUIName = #autoLOC_6005002    //#autoLOC_6005002 = Toggle Airlock
        startEventGUIName = #autoLOC_6005003    //#autoLOC_6005003 = Open Airlock
        endEventGUIName = #autoLOC_6005004    //#autoLOC_6005004 = Close Airlock
        allowAnimationWhileShielded = False
    }
    MODULE
    {
        name = ModuleScienceContainer
        reviewActionName = Review Stored Data
        storeActionName = Store Experiments
        evaOnlyStorage = True
        storageRange = 1.5
    }
}

 

Paste this into GameData/SquadExpansion/Parts/Coupling/InflatableAirlock.cfg ant it will dock with regular clampotrons

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