CobaltWolf

PLEASE READ THIS POST FOR INFORMATION ON THE FUTURE OF THE MOD SEP v2.7.1 This is a continuation of the mod originally created by @AlbertKermin, and now co-authored by him, myself, and @DMagic. I'm merely starting a new thread so that I (as a more active user) can maintain the thread as needed. SEP now runs on a custom science plugin, allowing much more complex science over time. (See the next post for more images!) Changelog: Mod Support: This mod has custom science definitions for CaptRobau's wonderful Outer Planets Mod. This mod has custom science definitions for KillAshley's New Horizons Pack. @Nils277 has made a Central Station wedge for use with his Kerbal Planetary Base Systems mod. Run a SEP off your ground base! RemoteTech compatible (requires Module Manager) AntennaRange compatible (requires Module Manager) Dependencies: KospY + IgorZ's wonderful Kerbal Inventory System/Kerbal Attachment System. Credits: AlbertKermin, for creating the original MSEP mod, helping create the original SEP mod, and contributing sciencedefs for the current iteration. CobaltWolf, for creating the new models and parts used in the mod. DMagic for creating the new plugin on which the science system runs. KospY, for the Kerbal Attachment System mod without which my mod could not exist. Vaga, who created the RemoteTech compatibility patch. Kerbas_ad_astra, who created the AntennaRange patch. Beale, whose solar panel texture we used (with permission). Enceos, for his amazing help with converting the original mod to use KIS. JefferyCor, for advice on repairing one of this mod's more troublesome bugs. Dunrana for helping write the Science definitions, testing, and generally getting me back to work on the mod. Shameless plug: Need a lander to carry your SEP down to the surface? Like a fine wine, SEP pairs excellently with Bluedog Design Bureau - which includes a stockalike version of the LEM lander! License: This work is presented under a Simplified BSD license. Art assets used in Surface Experiment Pack were made by Matthew (CobaltWolf) Mlodzienski and are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. All credit for the wonderful new textures/models/artwork goes to CobaltWolf, who retains the copyright to his work. All source files for the mod, including uncompiled textures and models, are available upon request. We back boys!

was referring to what I posted on the first which was Lunar Orbiter

The panels are pretty much done, I have to finish the core. I might put it up and ask for suggestions on details for it.

???

^This guy gets it.

Squad insists on having the stock joint strength be somewhere in 'wet noodle' territory. Either install Kerbal Joint Reinforcement, or (as @hraban said) autostrut all the bigger parts. If you don't have autostrut available in the right click menu in the VAB, you need to go into the game settings and enable advanced tweakables. Make sure you don't use rigid attach on the first stage engine mount, IIRC that causes explosions. Even with KJR, I still autostrut the LES to the root part (Command pod).

Yup, @Jso edited it this morning!

I create my specular and bump/normal maps by just duplicating layers from my diffuse texture onto a new document. I then just go through and do adjustment layers one by one to get the desired effect. Takes 20-30 minutes tops to create specular and normal maps for a texture sheet, and mine are pretty complex. The boost to the quality is well worth the time invested IMO.

Very cool! Any idea what the final station design will look like? Or will we have to wait?

Best was still the time some troll reuploaded BDB to Spacedock and the file in the download was just a renamed FASA.zip

Should be! If not (or if CKAN thinks the mod is outdated) please let me know so I can poke the CKAN peoples and ask them to update our listing.

@pap1723 hasn't logged in since mid-November. We'll have to see.

Dev stream is now live!

Is that polygons or tris (triangles)? Tris are the actual number you want since the mesh will get converted to tris in Unity anyways. Those is fairly high - most KSP engines, being (on average) some of the most detailed parts, aim for somewhere between 3000 and 5000 tris. NOW, with that said, there is certainly nothing stopping you from having that many; it's definitely not wrong. Part of the reason for sticking to that range of polygons is (in my opinion) to keep the style relatively simple/cartoony, which isn't what you're going for - at least, not to the same extreme as the stock game. It's a bit late to be changing those things now, but if its something you want to worry about in the future, some things to watch out for would be stuff like how many sides are on your cylinders and pipes. The difference between a pipe with 6 or 8 sides, and one with 24 or 12, is barely noticeable - but the number of tris is exponentially less. tl;dr: Yes, that's high, but if it's not something you're worried about (ie you want these to be high quality, detailed engines) then don't worry. Definitely something to keep in mind though. @Alcentar quick follow up. I've noticed you've modeled in a lot of details that could be done way more efficiently with normal mapping. That's another thing to keep in mind. I know that they won't look QUITE as good, but the other thing to keep in mind is that most of the time the engine will be very small in the player's window, and the difference won't be visible. I've circled the details that could be replaced with normal mapping in red. Also, how are you creating those pipes? (I've circled some in green) If they are being created using curves, playing with the values for the geometry can save some polygons. Play with it until you find the balance between quality and polycount, and then you can go in and hand merge some extra vertices in select spots. Apologies if this is unhelpful/unwanted.

Understandable. Do you know what kind of polycount the engines are?

What is the reasoning behind working at double resolution? And do they have to be 1024x768? EDIT: Just to throw in the tag, @DoctorDavinci

Proud to offer our services! Trying to get back into the swing of working on KSP stuff. Going to try and stream tonight, get some work done on trying to clean stuff up for the release. Starting some time between 6 and 7 Eastern time, over on Twitch. Gonna fiddle around with an idea I had, and try to get the Blok V Apollo parts in game.

Looks heckin' beautiful! Are you going to make Specular/Normal maps for them?

You installed the stock scale MM patches (to make the parts, well, stock scaled instead of real scale) but are trying to use the real scale craft files.

@Nhawks17 we had a question over at BDB. Is it possible to use have the plume change based on the part upgrade system added in 1.2? Size/shape/etc, but also one of the proposed upgrades converts the Redstone from LOX/Ethanol to LOX/Hydyne (aka Bagels and LOX), which is a storable propellant. If that is possibly it would be very cool.

Uhm, is it ready to be released? That's the question I think. I don't remember where I left off.

As Foxx said, none of the full time devs for BDB work on IVAs. The return on time investment is almost non existent. There are volunteers working on IVAs but I'd rather not call them out; they're not under any obligation (at least, not the same way I sort of am) to finish whatever they start working on. @StarStreak2109 looks awesome!

Doesn't this pack have/support having big radiators like on the ISS? They're supposed to be fragile station parts. I don't see why they'd need good heat tolerance.