Squadcast Summary (2015-02-14) - The Valenti-nope Edition

[BudgetHedgehog]

Hullo everyone, and here's the summary for Squadcast 2015-02-14.

Sorry for speeling mistakes, I'm a terrible transcriber. I try and clarify what is an actual quote from Max (if it's wrapped in "quotation marks", it's the best transcript of an official Squad member you'll find on the web), and what is a summary from myself as I'm aware I switch between the two with 0 notice. When I say 'Squad', I mean 'the relevant people who are currently developing the game'.

As always, this is just a transcript of an off the cuff vlog of a non-native english speaker - some details may change or be entirely incorrect. Here we go!

Squadcast Summary for 2015-02-14 - Watch it here!

Max had to choose something to do, he chose rescuing a kerbal, blah blah blah.. gotta make a base that turned out to have to be attached to a class C asteroid, whoops.. anyway!

ESA logos and decals are in, which is groovy.

Wanted to present Valentina today, but plans changed. The design was complicated and required a lot of work, but we're going to meet her faster than we think. The idea was to make female kerbals as disposable as the guys and Max thinks they kinda succeeded. They have a completely different models, new frames, new heads, this isn't just a retextu..

*break because Maxs phone rings*

Little family emergency, but all ok, let's get back to work. Anyway, the aerodynamics overhauls means building spaceplanes won't be as intuitive as building rockets, but that's just to be expected.

The engineers report is pretty much final, it's nice to have the game tell you if things aren't working and why. These tips, as mentioned a while ago, consist of like "Hey Max, your vessel is manned but you have no way of returning them safely i.e. with parachutes. Is that intended?". Also, as mentioned last week, a lot of old knowledge needs to be forgotten - the old 45@10k ascent will still likely work, but won't be the most efficient, due in part to the huge rebalancing. But yeah, should be fun to relearn how to do it properly.. Still "kinda sucks though".

HotRockets would be a nice addition, but time is of the essence. (OWK: HotRockets was previously noted as being Max's favourite mod in his reddit AMA)

Supersonic effects took a lot of time this week, things like when you passed Mach 1, your drag changes and stuff.. yeah, mach effects are tricky but totally confirmed. With regards to FAR and the new aero, there are quite a lot of differences, mainly due to the access the devs have (i.e. to everything), so yeah, somethings are done differently to FARs methods, but the end results should be the similar (OWK: and if not, there's always that on/off switch mentioned a while ago..). Asymmetric flameout is fixed because it shouldn't really exist, Squad are "reworking how fuel and resource flow works while in the air", so that should help reduce or ameliorate asymmetric flameouts for air-breathers.

"We might actually need PreciseNode in the game" says Max, as he struggles with gettings a rdz with a kerbal. The flickering you get when you have a close encounter really needs to be fixed, yeah.

Squad feels like they can do better than some AAA releases with regards to releasing a game without bugs. Loads of oooooold bugs are being fixed.

PorkJet is working on IVAs - frizzank and PJ are working together and should be able to deliver IVAs for literally every single crewable part in the game. No placeholdlers at all, you get an IVA, you get an IVA, IVAs for everything!

Chase camera has been "tweaked to make you not feel as nauseous" and joystick support has been improved so less unbinding, more axes support.

The admin building l pool may have proper water in, but it's kinda cool to have a throwback to the old water in older versions (the pool water is rendered the same way as the water was in older KSPs). Don't know if it'll be fixed.

New landing gear is looking incredible, here's a gif, courtesy of /u/Mach_XXII on reddit. No word if they're medium or large, but props to PJ, they look great. And yes, the multiple wheels work:

(Apparently, Squad are working on a new and better landing gear module as the old one was pretty much only good for the current small gear. Not sure of specifics though).

Here's resources - green is loads of it, red is less, no overlay is none. Non depletable, just decreasing. Kinda like Karbonite, it is very close to it.

Hopefully next week, Squad will be able to show us Valentina.

And that's it, Max is out of time and I'm out of social lubricant, so I'll see you all next week!

Edited February 14, 2015 by ObsessedWithKSP
Quick fix/landing gear info

[Thomas988]

Yes! I love these! So much exciting stuff for 1.0!

[Mach_XXII]

cant wait to see how the IVAs turn out

[Thomas988]

cant wait to see how the IVAs turn out

Definitely. Especially with PorkJet on the case I'm sure the IVas will turn out to be nothing but incredible. I'm also hoping the current IVAs can get a good modern revamp.

[cpast]

Is it just me, or has 1.0 development been much faster than other versions? What's changed?

[r_rolo1]

You forgot to mention about the dV on engineers that, recalling from memory "It will not be directly tied with experience, but will have to be earned"

[Spuds]

You know... I'm now starting to become VERY optimistic about 1.0. I was initially reluctant, to say the least, but the effort that they are putting in and the polish that they are adding makes me very excited for this update.

frizzank and PJ are working together and should be able to deliver IVAs for literally every single crewable part in the game.

OH SNAP! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

[lajoswinkler]

This is very, very good news. It seems like you're doing a huge work for this version, uncomparable to the previous ones.

I'll just ask about that chase camera. What does it mean less nauseous? It's fine as it is, except that it doesn't work on Kerbals. That should be fixed.

[Bill Phil]

Interesting. Seems like a big update.

[katateochi]

oooo that landing gear looks sweet! Resource overlay looks ok, a bit like the kethane overlay but actually on the surface which is nicer. I'm guessing mods like ScanSAT will be able to display it on maps (personally I prefer having the data on a map, rather than as an overlay because I find that the overlay breaks the sense of immersion and kinda makes landing in the right spot far too easy). Has there been any talk about new stock parts for mining and converting?

Re the aerodynamics, I'm reserving judgement till after I've tried it (and finished crying over my current SSTO's as I drag them to the scrap yard.)

Thanks OWK, great summary as always!

[Dodgey]

Is it just me, or has 1.0 development been much faster than other versions? What's changed?

Well they have both frizzank and PJ working on content for it, also didn't RoverDude help out as well? So they've had a bit of help.

[Brotoro]

Ooooo...I highly approve of Precise Node being incorporated into stock game. I'm all in favor of Squad's choices that allow me install fewer mods!

Edited February 14, 2015 by Brotoro

[Tommygun]

I wish the camera angle would allow viewing or pointed away from the craft so you could take screen shots without the craft in view.

[neamerjell]

I'm excited about KSP 1.0! I nearly uninstalled Elite Dangerous when it hit 1.0 because they didn't deliver on their promises (landing on planets, IVA, EVA)

[BudgetHedgehog]

Has there been any talk about new stock parts for mining and converting?

It's safe to assume that between 1 and all of the old resource assets will be incorperated:

Old overlay, just look at the craft. More pics can be found in other resource threads

Edited February 14, 2015 by ObsessedWithKSP

[passinglurker]

so why does the resource scanner in the picture say ore? placeholder?

[BudgetHedgehog]

so why does the resource scanner in the picture say ore? placeholder?

Before someone asks - the 'Ore' is test data

Source. So yes, placeholder.

[SaturnV]

NO MORE.

Just shutup and take my money

[PDCWolf]

The engineers report is pretty much final, it's nice to have the game tell you if things aren't working and why. These tips, as mentioned a while ago, consist of like "Hey Max, your vessel is manned but you have no way of returning them safely i.e. with parachutes. Is that intended?". Also, as mentioned last week, a lot of old knowledge needs to be forgotten - the old 45@10k ascent will still likely work, but won't be the most efficient, due in part to the huge rebalancing. But yeah, should be fun to relearn how to do it properly.. Still "kinda sucks though".

WHY

HOW

This only means the simulation is still incorrect and/or inconsistent, unless it assumes enough control authority (read: loadsa fins or huge thrust vectoring)

[BudgetHedgehog]

This only means the simulation is still incorrect and/or inconsistent, unless it assumes enough control authority (read: loadsa fins or huge thrust vectoring)

To be fair though, with an appropriately slow speed and amount of of fuel, that works with FAR too. Needs more fuel but Max did say it wasn't efficient... And it's totally doable with stock gimbal/control surface range, just gotta make sure you don't do the whole 45 turn at once. Split it up over 20 odd degrees every 2 seconds to reduce stress (and that's probably the max AoA you'll get). Granted, I've never tried it but that's because it sucks as an ascent profile, but from what I've experienced, yeah, it'll be possible but by far one of the least efficient ways to get to orbit.

[regex]

Thanks again, ObsessedWithKSP, we really appreciate this!

ESA logos and decals are in, which is groovy.

More? Awesome!

The idea was to make female kerbals as disposable as the guys and Max thinks they kinda succeeded.

I mean, it's great we're going for equality here, but maybe we could go for something better than "equally disposable".

IVAs are awesome, maybe we could have some actual functionality in them?

[PDCWolf]

To be fair though, with an appropriately slow speed and amount of of fuel, that works with FAR too. Needs more fuel but Max did say it wasn't efficient... And it's totally doable with stock gimbal/control surface range. Granted, I've never tried it but that's because it sucks as an ascent profile, but from what I've experienced, yeah, it'll be possible but by far one of the least efficient ways to get to orbit.

For the airflow not to knock your rocket over and flipping it, you should be going really really slow (and that's going slow at 10000 meters, very inefficient, maybe to the point of actually needing a little bit bigger rocket kind of inefficiency). Obviously turning is easy, the hard part with vectoring is counteracting the airflow wanting to flip your rocket (if you have no fins, obviously).

[r4pt0r]

New landing gear is looking incredible, here's a gif, courtesy of /u/Mach_XXII on reddit. No word if they're medium or large, but props to PJ, they look great. And yes, the multiple wheels work:

http://i.imgur.com/3aj2F7U.jpg

ObsessedWithKSP: I really, really, really like this image.

[GusTurbo]

Oh man, this feels like the salad days before .19. Really exciting to see everything coming together.

[basic.syntax]

Some nice info! Thanks again, ObsessedWithKSP. The anticipation is building

That landing gear looks really hefty, extending to offer ground clearance for craft.

For easy landing on resources, I wonder if the scanner item has to be built into a craft.

It could be a bit more challenging if we need to remember the overlay, or switch between ships, while steering to land parts for resource extraction.

For career mode, I'm hoping scanner quality of info will improve with R&D and/or tracking facility upgrades.

(I don't think early career should need to go mining, until ready to leave Kerbin SOI.)

----

Edit: "Asymmetric flameout is fixed because it shouldn't really exist"

-yay!

Edited February 14, 2015 by basic.syntax