Functional Crawlerway.

[I likeOxidizerrfuel]

Make the Crawlerway functional so that you could get rockets from the VAB to the Launch pad and it could be turned off in dificuty settings.

[Gargamel]

4 hours ago, I likeOxidizerrfuel said:

Make the Crawlerway functional so that you could get rockets from the VAB to the Launch pad and it could be turned off in dificuty settings.

Aside from a coolness factor, to what end?   How would this benefit the game?   I can see it be added (if it's even possible) into a mod like Kerbal Construction Time, but I don't see any benefits other than being really cool. 

If the devs are going to put this much work into something new, and I'm guessing it would be a lot of work, I'd rather see them focus their efforts on features that affect more of the gameplay than just one tiny aspect of it. 

[swjr-swis]

5 hours ago, Gargamel said:

I don't see any benefits other than being really cool.

'Really cool' sounds like a perfect rationale for something to be added to a game.

Several years ago: "You know what would be really cool? A game about building rockets...!" "Dude!"

(ok sorry, the dude part just seemed to fit the mental scene)

 

10 hours ago, I likeOxidizerrfuel said:

Make the Crawlerway functional so that you could get rockets from the VAB to the Launch pad and it could be turned off in dificuty settings.

I agree it's a missing visual from the game. I would be content to see it just as a 'live action' cut-scene that -optionally- runs when you press Launch from the VAB.

I do agree with @Gargamel though that it'd be down the list in priorities.

[Vexillar]

@Gargamel makes a good point.  As players, we all have our own preferences around the game and its immersive elements.  Squad need to concentrate their efforts on the core game, and we're seeing that at the moment.

But here's a thought for the modders: a simple way to grant @I likeOxidizerrfuel's wish would be to add a new launch "site" at the VAB end of the crawlerway.  It's then up to the player to build their rocket, launch tower and crawler, "launch" it just outside the VAB, then try to maneuver the whole contraption into place at the other end without it falling over .

(And for even more realism there's nothing to stop the yet more adventurous building a separate launch tower on the pad and docking the crawler/rocket to it before lighting up.)

[adsii1970]

Where did the launch towers go? I remember FASA had them, then at one point, and in one version of KSP, wasn't there was a stock launch tower... or was I dreaming?

2 hours ago, Vexillar said:

(And for even more realism there's nothing to stop the yet more adventurous building a separate launch tower on the pad and docking the crawler/rocket to it before lighting up.)

Well, I even built a ship to recover the capsules. So, yeah, if I had a decent launch tower, I'd probably make a crawler, too...

2 hours ago, swjr-swis said:

I do agree with @Gargamel though that it'd be down the list in priorities.

I agree, also.

[swjr-swis]

43 minutes ago, adsii1970 said:

Where did the launch towers go? I remember FASA had them, then at one point, and in one version of KSP, wasn't there was a stock launch tower... or was I dreaming?

From the KSP patch notes summary in the readme.txt, under version 0.19, we find this entry:

Quote

* New mesh for the launch pad area, now with 100% less launch tower.

 

[adsii1970]

1 hour ago, swjr-swis said:

From the KSP patch notes summary in the readme.txt, under version 0.19, we find this entry:

 

I knew I wasn't going crazy! Thanks, @swjr-swis, for restoring my faith in my (often bad) memory!

[pandaman]

For me a crawlerway animation would  be one of those 'quite nice things to watch' - once - then disable it.

Unless it was an optional part of actual gameplay, and served an actual purpose, it would just be an annoyance for me.  Those thing move REALLY slowly.

 

[The Aziz]

6 hours ago, swjr-swis said:

I agree it's a missing visual from the game. I would be content to see it just as a 'live action' cut-scene that -optionally- runs when you press Launch from the VAB.

Everything is better than black screen with tiny loading solar system animation. Plane slowly taxiing to the runway when you go from SPH, crawler on crawlerway etc.
The problem is... actually, more than one. First, what plane? Generic one? Like stearwing? Same thing applies to rockets, what, Kerbal X?

Then goes another issue, which is loading time. For people with supercomputers it ends within miliseconds, so that would mean either the animation is cut or sped up. For potato owners, the animation would be really slow or repeated.

However

6 hours ago, Vexillar said:

a new launch "site" at the VAB end of the crawlerway.  It's then up to the player to build their rocket, launch tower and crawler, "launch" it just outside the VAB, then try to maneuver the whole contraption into place at the other end without it falling over .

would be a nice addition for those who want it (so, mods.)

Edited August 20, 2018 by The Aziz

[swjr-swis]

25 minutes ago, The Aziz said:

The problem is... actually, more than one. First, what plane? Generic one? Like stearwing? Same thing applies to rockets, what, Kerbal X?

Then goes another issue, which is loading time. For people with supercomputers it ends within miliseconds, so that would mean either the animation is cut or sped up. For potato owners, the animation would be really slow or repeated.

This is why I said 'live action cut scene', and not 'video'. This feature would only have a (small?) recurring entertainment value if the craft used in the cut-scene was rendered from the actual craft launched.

Being rendered 'live', I don't see why the processing power would matter much: if the computer has enough power to fly the craft, it can also render a predetermined animation path - even easier, since physics calculations would not be required. And for those that left the option on and don't want to wait through the entire animation for a particular launch, a quick tap of the mythical 'any key' could stop the animation and move on directly to the flight scene.

A bigger issue may be that we regularly come up with contraptions to 'launch' that would be decidedly silly or impossible to put on a crawler - but with the option to skip the animation when we don't want it, I don't see why that should have to be in the way of a bit of eye candy. Heck, it might even provide some entertainment of its own.

Edited August 20, 2018 by swjr-swis
lack of sleep seems to affect typing. who knew.

[Vexillar]

7 hours ago, swjr-swis said:

 

Quote

* New mesh for the launch pad area, now with 100% less launch tower.

 

From what I remember, lots of people found their rockets often collided with the tower on launch.  As an improvement, the tower was replaced by the launch stabilisers we have now.

[Gargamel]

8 hours ago, swjr-swis said:

This is why I said 'live action cut scene', and not 'video'. This feature would only have a (small?) recurring entertainment value if the craft used in the cut-scene was rendered from the actual craft launched.

So if we do a cut scene using the actual craft, it will have to be loaded into the physics engine in Unity, which means another long load wait, and then reload the same craft again on the pad, making us wait again.    Not to mention all the extra funky physics bugs rendering a cut scene would introduce into the game.    We already have issues that if the devs change one little thing on a wing piece, a moon three planets over gets destroyed.     I think having the craft load multiple times is just asking for bad things to happen. 

[swjr-swis]

1 hour ago, Gargamel said:

So if we do a cut scene using the actual craft, it will have to be loaded into the physics engine in Unity, which means another long load wait, and then reload the same craft again on the pad, making us wait again.    Not to mention all the extra funky physics bugs rendering a cut scene would introduce into the game.    We already have issues that if the devs change one little thing on a wing piece, a moon three planets over gets destroyed.     I think having the craft load multiple times is just asking for bad things to happen.

You are over-complicating things. The cut-scene would be a completely predetermined animation path without any need for physics whatsoever, since there will be no unexpected interactions at all. The only variable would be the launched craft , and it would only need to be rendered as a completely non-interactive static model pinned on top of the crawler. How much physics processing is spent on rendering the vehicles driving around the tier 3 VAB/SPH? It's the same basic thing. If your computer can switch back and forth in and out of the VAB/SPH without a moon three planets over getting destroyed, it can render a non-interactive cut-scene too.

[0111narwhalz]

8 minutes ago, swjr-swis said:

How much physics processing is spent on rendering the vehicles driving around the tier 3 VAB/SPH?

A couple versions ago on the Mac edition: disturbingly large amounts.

[Cheif Operations Director]

12 hours ago, pandaman said:

For me a crawlerway animation would  be one of those 'quite nice things to watch' - once - then disable it.

Unless it was an optional part of actual gameplay, and served an actual purpose, it would just be an annoyance for me.  Those thing move REALLY slowly.

 

It would be good for cinematics I would do it once in a awhile seeing as it just an animation with the Rocket inserted They could give it to the art team if they have time to kill

[StarStreak2109]

No way I want to go through the tedium of watching a crawler creep from the VAB to the launch pad. Besides it would create additional issues. The VAB doors would need to animate. We would limit ourselves to ships fitting into the VAB, be aus it would look like excrements, if the rocket would come out of the VAB whilst clipping the roof. The ramp to the launch pad is way to steep.

TLDR, you would look at a complete redesign of core game assets. I would have my doubts, if they could even be remade in the original B9 style, given how the devs are set up these days.

The only way I could imagine something like that is as part of a progress "bar" in conjunction with a stock implementation of Kerbal Construction Time.

There's another thing, that is bugging me in this context much more. Why are there only these hideous "launch clamps" in the game? No launch tower nothing. These would be nedofor any kind of crawler...

[I likeOxidizerrfuel]

15 hours ago, StarStreak2109 said:

No way I want to go through the tedium of watching a crawler creep from the VAB to the launch pad. Besides it would create additional issues. The VAB doors would need to animate. We would limit ourselves to ships fitting into the VAB, be aus it would look like excrements, if the rocket would come out of the VAB whilst clipping the roof. The ramp to the launch pad is way to steep.

TLDR, you would look at a complete redesign of core game assets. I would have my doubts, if they could even be remade in the original B9 style, given how the devs are set up these days.

The only way I could imagine something like that is as part of a progress "bar" in conjunction with a stock implementation of Kerbal Construction Time.

There's another thing, that is bugging me in this context much more. Why are there only these hideous "launch clamps" in the game? No launch tower nothing. These would be nedofor any kind of crawler...

The way I would think of it would unlimited craft size AND kerbal construction time should not be stock and the VAB doors wouldn't need to open it would only be if he or she would like it or no.

 

[Gargamel]

On 8/20/2018 at 9:13 PM, swjr-swis said:

You are over-complicating things. The cut-scene would be a completely predetermined animation path without any need for physics whatsoever, since there will be no unexpected interactions at all. The only variable would be the launched craft , and it would only need to be rendered as a completely non-interactive static model pinned on top of the crawler. How much physics processing is spent on rendering the vehicles driving around the tier 3 VAB/SPH? It's the same basic thing. If your computer can switch back and forth in and out of the VAB/SPH without a moon three planets over getting destroyed, it can render a non-interactive cut-scene too.

To render the ships as physicsless would require the devs to include another engine to process just the cut scene you want.  That would make KSP even more cumbersome.  There may be other work arounds for it, but still, an insane amount of work would be required.  As I said, I would prefer this amount of work required by the devs to be spent on other aspects of the game.

Now as a mod, I am all for this.  The coolness factor alone would be worth seeing this a few times, even if it did melt my computer into a slag heap.  

[The Aziz]

Aight, hold on a sec. Don't we have kerbin-side mod? That one that adds tons of launchsites to the map? Why won't we use it? Just ask the modder for another starting point "just out of VAB" that way we can build a crawler ourselves and drive it to the launchpad.

[I likeOxidizerrfuel]

I'm sorry to point it out but the way you guys were saying how the Crawlerway should be done is just One of Many ways SQUAD will do the Crawlerway or A Modder will do it.So this is how I think it should be done. So it's like the way the way the Space Shuttle was crawled on the Crawlerway, Upright and there would like this Code that would just Instruct the vehicle to the launch pad. If he or she would like to disable it in game settings he or she can do it, OR add a Static Sturcture that the SaturnV Used to get to the pad. Thank you for reading this and have a great night or day! 

Edited August 24, 2018 by I likeOxidizerrfuel
Grammer!

[theJesuit]

On 8/21/2018 at 12:58 AM, pandaman said:

<snip>

Those thing move REALLY slowly.

 

Not if it was done in a Kerbalish way.

Peace.

[StarStreak2109]

Then I can promise you that there will be people complaining how unrealistic it is.

[Dman979]

Hey guys, just a friendly reminder that insulting other users based on the platform they choose to play KSP on is not allowed. Some posts have been removed.

 

[HansonKerman]

This sounds interesting.

[Aeroboi]

NO to this idea.

First of all, it isn't cool. Waiting for a rocket to roll out of a building to a launchpad simply isn't cool. If that is what people find cool then they're lame while stuck in their own sense what cool isn't, got that?

Realistically this takes many hours. So now you have to plan when to roll out because you never want to launch at dusk/night.... right?
Whereas the unrealistic version is that this all happens in 30 seconds in a animation, which is just stupid, then why even request this at all. Why want this for that purpose, go to youtube and watch the spaceshuttle being walked out from the VAB if that is your tea time fill in.

Such ideas begin as a feel good idea. The OP might be bliss for the first 2 times liking how cool the new animation is, then makes the same conclusion I do that it is cumbersome and unwanted and a waste of your time and of Squads service.

Now for some practical arguments. We have very small rockets, very big rockets and rocket bigger then the VAB itself. The last 2 class rocket sizes (the last definitely) usually require launch clamps, which are static objects to be remained in place and often stick out from the launchpad because you tried glueing 6 saturn 5 lower stages together which overlaps the base of the launchpad and consequently the crawler also.
So how is the crawler going to carry all that without looking mismatched with Stratzenblitz 109.000 Ton launcher?
Are the launch clamps going to walk along with the crawler or spawned at the launchsite? The last one is a solution, but will look pathetic, just saying.
High part count vessels tend to slow down the system to a crawling state got the word joke?

So what we will get is a random rocket of anybodies making that I or anyone could have made that is badly scaled for possibly a few size varieties of crawlers with launch clamps sticking out while traveling along with the crawler and then we can't also make high part count rockets (500-1500 parts) because that freezes most systems to 1 fps where waiting for a rocket of kiloton sizes to roll to the launchpad actually becomes torture.

But somehow, somewhere somebody thought this was a good new idea.
 

 

Edited August 30, 2018 by Aeroboi