[1.2] Real Solar System v12.0 Dec 8

[cantab]

Having any axial tilt is impossible in KSP.

Well, not quite. Like I said, all celestial bodies must have parallel rotation axes; to put it another way, they must all have the same pole star. But they can have different orbital planes and from that can and do have axial tilts, since axial tilt is measured relative to the planet or moon's orbital plane. What is not possible in KSP is to vary axial tilt independently of orbital inclination. For example Bop in stock KSP has an axial tilt of 15 degrees.

Therefore when it comes to RSS, assuming you want the orbital inclinations to all be correct then only one celestial can be given the right axial tilt. The natural choice for said one celestial is Earth.

[Hattivat]

Has anyone made n RSS settings file without the axial tilt? Alternatively, do the old, pre-axial tilt settings files still work? And in this case what was the last version without the axial tilt? I really don't find this feature so interesting that I'm willing to accept its drawbacks unless it can't easily be reverted.

You do realize that without axial tilt the vast majority of real-world launch sites make no sense? Launching into an equatorial orbit from the kennedy space center is prohibitively expensive, not to even mention Baikonur (pretty much impossible from there), so in this scenario the only launch sites allowing you to get to the moon and beyond for a reasonable amount of delta-v would be Kourou and Omelek.

[Sparker]

so in this scenario the only launch sites allowing you to get to the moon and beyond for a reasonable amount of delta-v would be Kourou and Omelek.

I think you will still be able to launch to other planets, just more planning of the launch date will be needed.

I've got a question about textures. I like this Duna Mars terrain texture:

But somehow it switches to this one, also the view distance is reduced:

I can't find what I need to change in settings to enable the first texture. Everything is set to max now and i switched off ATM, but it doesn't work.

Edited February 22, 2015 by Sparker

[Errol]

Well, not quite. Like I said, all celestial bodies must have parallel rotation axes; to put it another way, they must all have the same pole star. But they can have different orbital planes and from that can and do have axial tilts, since axial tilt is measured relative to the planet or moon's orbital plane. What is not possible in KSP is to vary axial tilt independently of orbital inclination. For example Bop in stock KSP has an axial tilt of 15 degrees.

Therefore when it comes to RSS, assuming you want the orbital inclinations to all be correct then only one celestial can be given the right axial tilt. The natural choice for said one celestial is Earth.

All right, now I'm following. And learning, this is why I love KSP. So, given this limitation, what is this easiest way to configure the game in the following ways:

Maintain the kerbol system as is except;

-A small axial tilt given to kerbin only

-The mun's orbital inclination changed a small amount as well.

-I don't know enough about the mechanics (or the language) of it, but if the orientation of the inclination of the mun relative to the "tilt" of kerbin's axis stays locked (like the a vessel in orbit does) then that angle, or orientation, should be similar, but less, to the earth/moon relationship, however it is described.

And if I am correct in understanding it, the mun will, as a result of it's inclination change, have an axial tilt as well. Correct? This would fit perfectly into the play style I want. I like being able to use dV maps that folks have made for the stock kerbol system, and don't want to change that. I will also be using kerbin-side to change my launch site.

I'm planning to start my career over again with 1.0 when it is released, and would a little bit more challenge in the early game (might like to re-run the tutorials even, see what's been added when it comes out) with the bonus of some rewarding scenery (the same predictable appearance of kerbin on the muner horizon gets a bit repetitive when base building. I'd like a little variety in it's appearance/position. But would help a lot with immersion.

Edited February 23, 2015 by Errol

[NathanKell]

xrayfishx, I imagine the pretilt settings would work. Tweak the epoch as desired (RSS now starts in 1951, not 1950, e.g.)

Errol: nope, not quite. As cantab and Starwaster point out, KSP does not support axial tilt directly. Intead, axial tilt is precisely equal to inclination. In order to give Earth axial tilt, we inclined Earth's orbit 28 degrees. If you want only Kerbin to have axial tilt, then it will be (tilt degrees) out of plane with every other planet (unless you incline them all too, in which case they get axial tilt too). Further, if you want the Mun to be inclined relative to Kerbin's equator, it will have (inclination) degrees of axial tilt itself. That means that the delta V map will be totally wrong, since Kerbin will no longer be anywhere near in the same plane as the other planets.

Sparker: That's KSP itself fading in a normal map. Nothing RSS changes.

BTW, note: anyone shipping an RSS dll with your config (thyriel, say) please make sure you have the latest dll. Probus just spent a rather impressive amount of time today tracking down a bug, only to find that the RSS dll wasn't up to date.

[LostOblivion]

I'm looking for guides about how to do proper launches in FAR with staging suggestions with respect to TWR and the likes like those found for RSS at the bottom of the following page, only for stock sized Kerbin with FAR installed.

https://github.com/KSP-RO/RealismOverhaul/wiki/First-RO-Rocket

[Errol]

If you want only Kerbin to have axial tilt, then it will be (tilt degrees) out of plane with every other planet (unless you incline them all too, in which case they get axial tilt too). Further, if you want the Mun to be inclined relative to Kerbin's equator, it will have (inclination) degrees of axial tilt itself. That means that the delta V map will be totally wrong, since Kerbin will no longer be anywhere near in the same plane as the other planets.

This is exactly what I want to do. How is the easiest way do this? (is this the right mod for this, or do I want RO?)

Wouldn't doing the same change to all the bodies mean that there is the same dV required to go between them all?

Edited February 23, 2015 by Errol

[LostOblivion]

This is exactly what I want to do. How is the easiest way do this? (is this the right mod for this, or do I want RO?)

Wouldn't doing the same change to all the bodies mean that there is the same dV required to go between them all?

What matters is Kerbin's axial tilt compared to the ecliptic. Changing other planets' axial tilt in addition compared to the ecliptic makes it even harder. Also, the mun's axial tilt compared to its orbit around Kerbin, without respect to the ecliptic.

[Errol]

What matters is Kerbin's axial tilt compared to the ecliptic. Changing other planets' axial tilt in addition compared to the ecliptic makes it even harder. Also, the mun's axial tilt compared to its orbit around Kerbin, without respect to the ecliptic.

I don't know what is "harder" about that. Now that I think I understand the limitations of the game engine, I want to give kerbin axial tilt relative to the ecliptic, along with all the other planets. I want to just apply the same amount of change to all the planets orbital inclinations, so that they all get an apparent tilt. Except the mun, I want to change it's inclination slightly relative to kerbin's new orbit, so it is no longer on an equatorial orbit.

Does it require math to figure out how to change the orbits of all the moons to remain in the same relative inclination to their parent body (except the mun) as in stock after changing all the planetary orbital inclinations equally?

Edited February 23, 2015 by Errol

[Starwaster]

This is exactly what I want to do. How is the easiest way do this? (is this the right mod for this, or do I want RO?)

Wouldn't doing the same change to all the bodies mean that there is the same dV required to go between them all?

You don't, not with either. RO doesn't do anything like that except through RSS, and RSS only simulates it through inclination changes, which with the default RSS, it is already doing as best as can be done with the current KSP code base.

[Errol]

I guess what I'm trying to say is;

Is it possible to use RSS as stated:

RSS only simulates it through inclination changes, which with the default RSS, it is already doing as best as can be done with the current KSP code base.

Without any of the mass changing, size changing, re-arranging, re-texturing or re-naming of the planets to our solar system? I just want to add some axial tilt to stock. That's it. And some inclination/more tilt to the mun. Which I believe you are telling me is possible to do. I'm ok with all the planets having the same amount of tilt, in fact I would like that. I want all the planets to have the same relative inclination to each other as in stock as well, just plus a few degrees each so there's a tilt. And again, the mun gets an extra few degree inclination.

Would planet factory be capable of this?

[Starwaster]

I guess what I'm trying to say is;

Is it possible to use RSS as stated:

Without any of the mass changing, size changing, re-arranging, re-texturing or re-naming of the planets to our solar system? I just want to add some axial tilt to stock. That's it. And some inclination/more tilt to the mun. Which I believe you are telling me is possible to do. I'm ok with all the planets having the same amount of tilt, in fact I would like that. I want all the planets to have the same relative inclination to each other as in stock as well, just plus a few degrees each so there's a tilt. And again, the mun gets an extra few degree inclination.

Would planet factory be capable of this?

I have no idea what Planet Factory is or is not capable of; I don't use it.

To otherwise do what you are describing with RSS, you will either have to create a new set of configs from scratch or start with one of the alternate configs on the front page. (there are several listed)

Each planet's configuration can have axialTilt = <tilt value here> in it. See the RealSolarSystem.cfg file for examples.

As stated before, inclination will be calculated from the provided axialTilt values for each planet and inclination altered by the RSS plugin to simulate tilt.

[NathanKell]

Ah, if you just want every planet and moon to have, say, 28 degrees of axial tilt, that's easy. Start with a clean RealSolarSystem.cfg file, and add a node for each body. In each body's node, add an Orbit node, and inside that set inclination to (28 + whatever it was originally). However, you will also have to match LANs such that they're in the same plane, or things will get funky. The delta V map will then be wrong because Kerbin equatorial orbit (what you launch into from KSC) will no longer be in the plane of the ecliptic, so you'll have to launch into that latter plane (at higher cost) in order to do transfers at stated cost. Also the transfers to moons might be off.

[Kerbonaught]

Hey guys,

I downloaded the realism overhaul & suggested mods, including this one. I'm having trouble getting it to load & I think its something to do with RSS. I get past the loading screen to the start menu bit, RSS starts to load in & I get as far as Tylo before it stops on "Add PQSMod_VertexHeightMap". I've left it about 20mins and it hasn't moved...

Anyone got any ideas?

EDIT: Don't worry... downloading lower res textrues made it work

Edited February 24, 2015 by Kerbonaught

[Skyler4856]

Ah, if you just want every planet and moon to have, say, 28 degrees of axial tilt, that's easy. Start with a clean RealSolarSystem.cfg file, and add a node for each body. In each body's node, add an Orbit node, and inside that set inclination to (28 + whatever it was originally). However, you will also have to match LANs such that they're in the same plane, or things will get funky. The delta V map will then be wrong because Kerbin equatorial orbit (what you launch into from KSC) will no longer be in the plane of the ecliptic, so you'll have to launch into that latter plane (at higher cost) in order to do transfers at stated cost. Also the transfers to moons might be off.

Hey, Im still having an issue with ground depth at the KSC.

Here is my log:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/tpqtbb95jt94zdl/Player%20Revised.rtf?dl=0

[NathanKell]

Skyler4856, that's because you still don't have a properly installed texture pack. Please follow the instructions in the OP to download and install one.

[O Nerd]

I've been recently played with the updated version, and I just wanna thank you guys for all your effort. Nice job as always, actually, beta than ever.

[Sparker]

I am trying to drive my car on Mars surface but my car regularly falls through the ground and explodes. Is there a way to avoid this? Why does it happen?

Ok, I've noticed that it happens when car drives on next polygon ofr ground. Anyway, how do I lower the possibility of falling through?

Edited March 2, 2015 by Sparker

[VonFrank]

I cant believe I've never noticed this before, but Earth's heightmap is vertically exaggerated by an approximate value of 2.0. Mount Everest, for example, sits at a little over 18k m above sea level, when it should only be at 8,830m. And it's not just there. Most of the Antarctic Ice shelf sits around 7k masl while it should only be around 2-3k or so.

Is this only happening to me? Can anyone else confirm or deny this being a common glitch?

[LostOblivion]

RSS comes with several space centers and not just one. Is there a mod that does this for stock Kerbin? I don't want other building models, etc., just KSC at other locations. :-)

[peachoftree]

RSS comes with several space centers and not just one. Is there a mod that does this for stock Kerbin? I don't want other building models, etc., just KSC at other locations. :-)

Yes, it's called KerbinSide

[PLAD]

I am trying to drive my car on Mars surface but my car regularly falls through the ground and explodes. Is there a way to avoid this? Why does it happen?

Ok, I've noticed that it happens when car drives on next polygon ofr ground. Anyway, how do I lower the possibility of falling through?

I've done a lot of experimenting with this on the Moon. With KSP 0.25 and RSS 8.2.1 I found that if I kept my rover below 8.6m/s it would never fall through the terrain. At 8.6m/s it would eventually fall through, and the faster I went the shorter the distance it would go before it would fall through. I've accepted that as a reasonable speed limit on an alien world with no roads. But here's a trick-I was landing a ship on the Moon's South pole when I discovered the 'jagged' appearance of the surface there, it's a result of the terrain cells not meshing well where a whole bunch of them come together. I read that you could eliminate the jaggies by changing the game's graphics settings, "scenery", "terrain detail" to "high" so I did that and the jaggies disappeared. I then discovered that my rovers would not fall through the scenery anymore, at any speed! (Well, above 30m/s or so I always wipe out quickly so I can't be sure about really high speeds). I switched back to the default terrain detail and they fell through again. At least one mod makes getting rid of the jaggies impossible (active texture management), and then no matter what terrain detail is set at the rovers fall through. Conclusion: Poles are jagged, rovers fall through. Poles smooth, rovers don't fall through. You have to put something on the ground at the pole to see if the terrain is truly smooth, as looking from even a kilometer above the ground can hide the details.

I've just upgraded to KSP 0.90 and RSS 8.5, and it's behaving a bit differently. With ATM on (so poles jagged) and terrain detail on high the critical speed is around 9-10m/s but with detail on default it is lower than 5m/s. I'm still experimenting with that. If anyone else has done experiments on this I'd love to hear it. I want to check if any of the other scenery and rendering settings make a difference too. I've only done these tests on the Moon, I wonder if it's the same on other worlds?

[StoryMusgrave]

It's been mentioned before, but how about people keep in mind that 8.6m/s is nearly 20mph or about 31km/h and is 8+mph faster than the moon speed record. For more reference the curiosity rover top speed is 0.025m/s and average speed is 1/3 of that. So if you want to keep things realistic, maybe that 'limit' isn't so bad.

[SymbolicFrank]

Hi Nathan.

I applaud your and Ferram's efforts into making this realistic. I really want to use all of those mods.

So, I was wondering: how do you actually use and play them?

I bought KSP, played it for about 1 hour, searched for and installed MechJeb, and played some more. Installed the NearFuture stuff and KSP Interstellar, landed on almost all landable bodies, did most of the science, etc. Weeks of fun!

After that, I discovered Realism Overhaul. "COOL!" So I installed CKAN and checked it. Install as advised. It added about 1 GB to my install with the smallest DDS textures, so the playtime between crashes dropped to less than five minutes.

Hm.

Ok, it took me a while to figure out what was causing the main memory usage increase. But after reinstalling and just checking FAR, Real Fuels and such, but not Realism Overhaul or Real Solar System, memory usage dropped with about a GB, and it became playable again.

But then I discovered that FAR, Deadly Reentry and such are cool, but they disintegrate 90% of my realistic rockets. Ok, it's the joints, and you can disable it, but still. (And yes, Kerbal Joint Reinforcement is always installed.)

They also spin and wobble out of control all the time. You have to go great lengths to design a rocket/lander especially for FAR/DR to be able to make them work at all. And NEAR is even worse.

I mean, don't try to design and build a realistic one. That doesn't work. Use trial and error instead. Weird things might even "fix" it.

Of course, all of that is made worse because MechJeb doesn't work anymore. I tried the NEAR/FAR plugins, multiple better gimbals (with the MJ plugins), etc. No go.

Ok, I know there is Kos, and I might try and use that, but it would reduce my time to programming, instead of playing the game.

Not that I played the game much the last week or so. I was busy getting it to work at all.

I'm now back to mostly stock, which actually allows me to launch, control and land rockets, for about half an hour at a time. It's a shame, and I would really want KSP to be like you guys modded it, if only I could make it work. Ok, ok, if the Unity guys would finally fix 64-bit, it would all be much easier. Or if Squad had used an engine that can actually do it without having to revert to dirty hacks for just about anything. Etc.

And I'm a programmer IRL, so if I cannot get it to work, who can?

"It works for me!" is useless if you want others to use your stuff as well.

How do you actually play this?

It adds about 1 GB to a clean install, and reduces the playtime between crashes to less than five minutes.

Edited March 4, 2015 by goldenpeach

[Starwaster]

And I'm a programmer IRL, so if I cannot get it to work, who can?

"It works for me!" is useless if you want others to use your stuff as well.

How do you actually play this?

It adds about 1 GB to a clean install, and reduces the playtime between crashes to less than five minutes.

Being a programmer doesn't convey ability to make any of this work. I very much doubt most players of KSP are programmers. I'm one but that I'm not better at playing KSP or using these mods because of it.

If FAR destroys your creations then you need to relearn how to create them. Or relearn how to fly them. (personally I also consider FAR's aerodynamic failures excessively aggressive. But it IS totally possible to fly with it) (I don't use it anymore myself; I have a stock friendlier solution that works better with MJ. It's in my signature)

If Deadly Reentry is disintegrating your ships then you either need to relearn how to build so that parts of your ship aren't exposed or unshielded. Or learn proper reentry angles. Too shallow and you can deplete your shield before you've slowed to subsonic speeds. Too steep and aerodynamic stresses / gforces can kill Kerbals or destroy parts of your ship. For RSS sized Kerbin setting your periapsis to 60 usually gives you a decent angle.

As for program crashes, it's likely memory, but who can say without logs? (you're a programmer, you know the value of logs in troubleshooting). Still, if it's memory then are you using Advanced Texture Management? It cuts memory usage quite a bit.