Help noob

[Dts]

Ok...i'm not only a ksp noob but a p.c gamer noob. These controls are awful....i played simply rockets app game on ios and that was intuitive although 2d it was derailedand difficult. I. That game a ring was around the ship you used that for control and to see heading vs direction of thrust...i want that! Plus a secondary 3rd dimension ring to represent roll this navball is horrible and too much clutter to even find it useful...i am an ex helicopter mechanic amd i still find it useless...if this is a mod i can get please pointme to it..i tried mapping control to an xbox controller however , if you get into a spin in space breaking out of it is impossible because the game does not enable a heading direction just a thrust direction which means i gotta constantly change direction of thrust to match the opposite of the spin which is a no go...or maybe a mod for the ship to follow my cursor with the wheel being able to add the 3rd dimension of direction? In any case i love the concept of this game and i almost understand the difficulty of implementing controls over all these axis..until i realized my drone can with less buttons than a controller...and ahy don't lt and rt work on mapping controllers?

 

 

[KerikBalm]

I don't understand your complaint, other than there is something that you find hard to understand about the controls.

The rest... I'm sorry, but I don't understand what you are trying to convey.

[The Aziz]

13 hours ago, Dts said:

a ring was around the ship you used that for control and to see heading vs direction of thrust...i want that

Then you should try SimpleRockets/2 on pc. 

13 hours ago, Dts said:

navball is horrible and too much clutter to even find it useful..

Hmm? There is your marker,  current direction, heading, everything you need to know in relation to the horizon (exactly like in a plane)

13 hours ago, Dts said:

control to an xbox controller

I'd drop a controller on the floor and switch to keyboard unless you have an actual joystick. There's much more controls than you can bind on a gamepad. But that's me.

[The_Rocketeer]

15 hours ago, Dts said:

however , if you get into a spin in space breaking out of it is impossible because the game does not enable a heading direction just a thrust direction which means i gotta constantly change direction of thrust to match the opposite of the spin which is a no go

First, welcome to KSP and PC videogaming. Great choice for a first game btw, but you should definitely believe the stories you hear about the learning wall.

Taking a craft with no reaction wheels and no reaction-wheel-capable command module, what you said would probably be right, you'd depend on thrust vectoring to control attitude (meaning the direction you're pointing in). This is a very inefficient way to steer though unless you are conducting a burn anyway. That's why the game also has reaction wheels (and RCS thrusters).

If your craft has reaction wheels or a command module module that includes reaction wheels, this will allow you to control orientation without thrust, using only Electric Charge (you can also use RCS thrusters instead and they'll need monopropellant as fuel, but they're heavier and less efficient). If you run out of EC, it will stop working, so use batteries/solar panels/other power sources to make sure you don't. If you already have reaction wheels on your ship, I guess there's a chance you haven't figured out how to steer with them, although I think that's pretty unlikely.

Assuming you've got EC and reaction wheels on the ship, if you end up in a spin, shut off the thrust and turn on SAS. This will stop the rotation as the SAS controls and holds orientation for you.

Also, you can control a spin yourself. Look at the navball and see which way it's tumbling. Assume that the centre of the navball is always directly ahead of your ship, like a helicopter's artificial horizon. Steer towards the side that is emerging, and away from the side that is receding. When the navball stops tumbling, you have stopped tumbling too.
 

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and ahy don't lt and rt work on mapping controllers?

Possibly because they're not buttons but sliders. I have to agree with @The Aziz though, all you really want for this game as a start is a keyboard, a mouse and maybe a joystick. Speaking from firsthand exerience, a gamepad is going to be pretty limiting unless you go for some sort of hybrid arrangement with the keys too, which is inevitably very custom.

Edited May 23, 2020 by The_Rocketeer

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

As someone who started PC gaming in the late 70s...WASD +other keys and mouse are so intuitive (and frankly better in most ways) that I cannot understand the allure of Xbox controllers or mobile gaming gestures. Adding joystick controls with sliders (when a game is optimized for analog inputs) makes it even easier /better because the player has more control and options. 

I also thought that it was so intuitive and clearly better that everyone would naturally agree that PC is superior to any other platform. 

But then I tried to get my kid to play KSP.  He's so attuned to controllers (and the software shortcuts they employ) that he struggled with porting himself over to the PC the options and discovered wysiwyg and gigo frustrated. 

I can only imagine how much harder it could be to go from mobile gaming (which, without meaning to be insulting, has a dumbed down interface driven by the limits of the platform) where the players inputs are limited and the software does most of the work... It must be difficult to adapt from a mobile game with the few things that the player can or needs to do to KSP on the PC - where there are so many options and controls that can be used and need to be in different situations... You've got to be struggling not only with the game but also training your brain to think differently as well. 

All I can say is stick with it!  I think you will discover the joy of having options will be worth the trouble of teaching yourself to master M&K! 

Edited May 27, 2020 by JoeSchmuckatelli