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[1.12.x] Alcubierre Warp Drive (Stand-alone)

RoverDude

By RoverDude
in KSP1 Mod Releases

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Keymaster89

Keymaster89

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Depends. What problem are we trying to solve? The reason it even has a lockout range is because the drives are stupidly dangerous, so it's a safety thing. They were never designed to be used for atmospheric use. (If folks disagree, it's just a config edit).

I'm trying to solve exactly what u're describing. But instead of an on/off switch, a gradual shutoff of the drive, so if u want to start the drive at 100-150km u can do it at 5% throttle (for example), then while your altitude rises u can throttle up to full power.

This should work also in reverse, if u do a careless approach to a planet the drive will set automatically the max throttle accordingly to the altitude. NOTE: this doesn't mean that the drive can slow down fast enough anyway if u're pointing straigt at the planet as the drive have a max acceleration/deceleration!

See at it as the gravity well affecting the bubble, the drive compensate with a moderate throttle.

Edited by Keymaster89
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RoverDude

RoverDude

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I'm trying to solve exactly what u're describing. But instead of an on/off switch, a gradual shutoff of the drive, so if u want to start the drive at 100-150km u can do it at 5% throttle (for example), then while your altitude rises u can throttle up to full power.

This should work also in reverse, if u do a careless approach to a planet the drive will set automatically the max throttle accordingly to the altitude. NOTE: this doesn't mean that the drive can slow down fast enough anyway if u're pointing straigt at the planet as the drive have a max acceleration/deceleration!

See at it as the gravity well affecting the bubble, the drive compensate with a moderate throttle.

Let me put it another way.

Why do we feel the drive should be able to be engaged at 100KM vs. 500KM vs 1200KM? What gameplay benefit does a gradual throttle give us, since to be honest, there is no such thing as a gradual throttle with this... because either the percentage is so low as to be useless, or it nudges over half a percent or more and erases any difference in the numbers mentioned above because throttle in the lower range is exponential. 1% speed is still over 290,000 meters per second.

What mechanic you will likely see is cutoff based on planetary radius with a bonus or penalty for certain drives.

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Keymaster89

Keymaster89

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Let me put it another way.

Why do we feel the drive should be able to be engaged at 100KM vs. 500KM vs 1200KM? What gameplay benefit does a gradual throttle give us, since to be honest, there is no such thing as a gradual throttle with this... because either the percentage is so low as to be useless, or it nudges over half a percent or more and erases any difference in the numbers mentioned above because throttle in the lower range is exponential. 1% speed is still over 290,000 meters per second.

What mechanic you will likely see is cutoff based on planetary radius with a bonus or penalty for certain drives.

Well, i didn't considered that 1% throttle is still lightspeed...

I have to confess that i haven't tried the drive yet, i only see couple video on it, so i still don't know it's real power. I wanted to leave the suspance for when i'll unlock it in on my career :wink:

Sorry for that, maybe i shoudn't speak before try... :blush::sealed:

What i was trying to do was heavily limit the speed of the drive into the SOI as it approach a planet instead of a full stop, because as u arrive on a planet and a full stop occur at 500km your resulting vector could point right at the planet without the possibility to correct this (aside from a long and probably insufficient burn). I mean... a drive with this lifesaving system may cause more damage then a drive that doesn't have it.

At this point i do not know what to say in order to solve the problem... maybe instead of throttle, u can suppress max velocity make the drive slow under light speed, slower and slower as he approach, or u can add a second speed configuration, a ultra low speed warp with high manouverability, that consume matter like full speed and tons of xenon.

Anyway... this is just my brainstorming... do what u prefer :wink:

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capran

capran

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0.0.4 is up!

  • Updated Regolith DLL
  • Added Community Tech Tree support!
  • Added a translucent 'guide' to show the area of effect of the warp bubble
  • Included resource for ExoticMatter (fixed a loading issue)
  • Tweaked ISP, added an EC requirement
  • Adjusted minimum altitude to 500KM
  • Slowed animation of warp bubble, brightened and blended colors more
  • Automatically stiffen joints on bubble activation, relax on deactivation (less explosions - if your ship still blows up due to link failures, add struts).
  • Smoothed out accelleration
  • Changed display to be both M/S as well as percent of lightspeed
  • Added in max accelleration/decelleration values (watch out for this - no more insta-stop)
  • Added KSP-AVC support
  • Engines now require EC for operation

Just tried it, still having stuff blow up. Where am I supposed to put the struts? Can't attach anything to the warp drive except on the 2 included hard points. Can you enable surface attachment? Maybe add some more hard points too?

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RoverDude

RoverDude

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Well your right. if it went only at light speed it would take 8 minutes to get your craft to kerbin from the sun XD

Actually... on a straight burn you can go from the sun to the Eeloo apoapsis in four minutes at the drive's current config. There's no need right now to make it faster ;)

@Keymaster89 - play with it first please ;)

Just tried it, still having stuff blow up. Where am I supposed to put the struts? Can't attach anything to the warp drive except on the 2 included hard points. Can you enable surface attachment? Maybe add some more hard points too?

Creative use of girders as masts/spars to pull together parts that tend to fall apart easily, like the RCS tanks, SAS, etc. - I'll toss a pic up later.

You will absolutely have to get creative with your designs and drive carefully.

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cantab

cantab

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Why do we feel the drive should be able to be engaged at 100KM vs. 500KM vs 1200KM?
To the same account, why have the altitude limit at all?

The first thing I did was try and activate the drive on the pad for a laugh. When that did nothing it was a logical step to launch it into orbit and try there. If it had then not worked in my orbit it probably wouldn't have promptly occurred to me to try a higher orbit - there's no "Altitude too low" message after all.

So why not just make the drive need to be clear of the atmosphere on atmo bodies, and high enough that the bubble is clear of the terrain on vacuum ones?

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SpaceMouse

SpaceMouse

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Someone needs to come up with a numerical conversion for Lightspeed = Plaid.

RoverDude, i just tested it, at least on my ship, i was able to considerably exceed the 1.6 limit, i made it to 2.5 before efficiency dropped off substantially and things got rather wobbly. That limiter might be broken. Thought you'd want to know.

Hooray for warp rings! Shouldn't there be one for a interstellar colony ship that can exceed light-speed? Seems logical for true interstellar journeys.

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RoverDude

RoverDude

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@cantlab - two bits :) First, surprisingly hard to see if you are clear of terrain - it's an expensive operation. And second... you're out of warp distance almost instantly anyway, so once you're in orbit it doesn't matter as much. Suffice it to say that I have no intention of changing this mechanic. The current patch adds a parameter that determines cutoff range by percentage of the current celestial body's radius. So a larger bubble around Eve than Gilly. There are design reasons why this constraint is in place, so I really have no intention of changing it (you folks are of course free to do what you will with the config files).

@Spacemouse - fixed that issue in the next update. btw - you guys are already exceeding lightspeed. That '160%' is 160% the speed of light - which is about 300 million meters per second.

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AeroEngy

AeroEngy

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Does anyone know of a tutorial on the efficient method for using an AD. Like being able to jump between two planets without having to expend thousands of kilometers of dV? Either with this one of the KSPI. I believe they function the same but run off of different fuel types.

I made this awhile ago for KSPI for people to get an idea of how to use warp without using tons of fuel to to match velocities.

Basic steps are match velocity direction, then magnitude and then jump to target.

1) Warp close to Kerbol and wait for craft velocity to be parallel to your target.

2) Warp so you are falling directly toward Kerbol. Wait until your V is the same magnitude as target. If you target is an outer planet then reverse the warp point so you are flying directly away from Kerbol.

3) Warp to target body with your V matched in direction and magnitude.

2ahhzma.jpg

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JamesL86

JamesL86

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Oh, hey, does this Warp Drive have a Training thing, like Majir had for Kethane?

I mean, it seems a bit more complicated, looking at the above illustration. So, ya know... instruct the lament on mastering this awesome drive you've made.

I've just been using it as a conventional engine. Fly straight at where you want to go. When you get within the SOI of the body you are going to, reduce the drive throttle. As you approach the planet, steer the ship into an orbit reducing throttle as you go. Once you get into an orbit, any orbit, use low throttle on the drive to circularize the orbit the best you can and finish it off with conventional engines. Its extremely easy actually. Far easier than the KSP-I drive.

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FreeThinker

FreeThinker

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I made this awhile ago for KSPI for people to get an idea of how to use warp without using tons of fuel to to match velocities.

Basic steps are match velocity direction, then magnitude and then jump to target.

1) Warp close to Kerbol and wait for craft velocity to be parallel to your target.

2) Warp so you are falling directly toward Kerbol. Wait until your V is the same magnitude as target. If you target is an outer planet then reverse the warp point so you are flying directly away from Kerbol.

3) Warp to target body with your V matched in direction and magnitude.

http://oi58.tinypic.com/2ahhzma.jpg

So Kerbol is like a warp superhighway :D

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Serino

Serino

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I seriously had to find this after finally setting up all my solar sats in kspi so I could pull 3-400 GW of power for my warp drive. Well there goes my save and half of the reason I still use kspi, the other half is the power beaming.

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