lo-fi

Cheers. Some stuff I can do, but the time I spend working on a texture, applying it to the model, then thinking 'that looks awful' could be much better applied to making funky new models and animations. I'm just no good with the 2D tools! Actually, what I'll do is create a Git repo which replicates the mass driver stuff in my KSP dev install. I keep a stable and test version. That way it'll always be up to date and you can pull over to your repo as you wish for the bigger changes.

Bah. I got distracted and didn't upload. Will sort out shortly. Glad you like it Desperately need a texture artist :/

Cheers, really appreciate it

This is lovely. What an original mod idea! Having had a quick look through the source and part.cfg, I'd love to see the Unity rig for the critter? Brilliant work.

Cool, what's your GitHub handle? No, not really looked into the delay bug, still thinking on it. Noticed something about how the tweaked value is saved in the save file, but not taken it any further yet. Just have a feeling it's going to be a tricky one :/ All works perfectly when you set in the VAB/SPH and I've not tried messing with other properties. Next thing is to add some code to modify the damper as a proportion of the spring value as I've found the damper wants to be spring / 7.5 for nice behaviour. I'll compile a test version of the DLL for you to enable in-flight tweaks so you can see for yourself. Be interested to see what you make of my wheels as well. I know what you mean about not getting to play the game! I only got round to getting to an asteroid so I could see what it looked like when I replaced the asteroid model with a kraken I knocked up Just thought it would be a laugh, then it got me looking at other stuff and I haven't stopped messing about with modding stuff since... Damn that kraken. Cool idea about the refuelling base.

That occurred to me too

Latest model, just showing off the firing sequence animation. Finally got to grips with it, just trying it out. Peter, I've added a dummy object called dockingNode, will upload the latest model to Git presently for you guys to try out.

Hello! I'm involved in a few projects at the moment, and while I'm pretty handy making models and rigging all the stuff in Unity, I completely lack artistic flair for making textures. Just thought I'd see if there are any talented people around who'd like to collaborate? Unwraps I are mostly done as I tend to set up as I go along, so I can supply labelled templates along with the models. Love to hear from anyone that's interested - will be fully credited as co-creator of whatever we produce. Here are a few of the models I've been creating, but I've got loads more in the pipeline:

I'll post some when I've finished wrangling the animation, docking node and some textures into shape, I promise! Very, very early stages at the moment

I've figured out how to modify settings of the wheelcollider. Very new to writing plugins, so it's rough but functional. Source here: https://github.com/Lo-FiOrbitalScience/KSPWheelPack?files=1 It doesn't work very well in realtime, though. Seems to modify the value, then ksp will all of a sudden realise it's changed a few minutes later! Still can't figure that out. Be interested to see what you can come up with, give me a shout if I can help at all.

Well yes, but more so you can jump in and contribute if you feel like it By the way, do you want a custom model for your engine mod? If you've got any ideas how you'd like it to look I'd be happy to knock something up when I have a few minutes free

Thanks, that might come in rather handy

You legend! That thread is an absolute gem, isn't it. The defaults are crazy, aren't they. Took me a while messing around to get something that works well. Top of my list to implement! That's seriously helpful. The part I'm stuck on is how to scan the vessel for wheels, assign them each a unique identifier and pair them up based on their position in the Z plane and +/- value in the X plane. I also want to use this info to implement steering based on how far the wheels are between the foremost or rearmost set of wheels from the CoM so they will steer an appropriate amount on vehicles with more than two sets of wheels. Getting this info set up seems to be the cornerstone of doing anything really useful. Which begs a sub question... is it better to have a part with the module assigned that does all thisrather than assigning the module to every wheel.? Call it a Rover Stability Module, a little like the MechJeb AR202. Yes, that puzzled me. Though real springs are usually rated in kg/mm deflection (I've worked in motorsport on and off) and nowhere in the docs can I find what the Unity rate actually represents. In practice, usable values do seems very, very low. Thanks for the pointers, be happy to add you to the GitHub project?

Excellent, was going to look into whether the stock models have a dummy gameobject somewhere. I'm having a really busy weekend, but will get some time over the next few days. Nice work guys.

No drama, thanks for taking the time out to look. Excited to see if I can pick this up

Oh, that's a shame. I'll have a nose through the bug tracker, see what I can dig up.

Cheers, be great if I can get hold of it. I'll double check, but I'm sure I didn't see it after the package import.

Awesome. Got a little held up doing bits on my wheel mod. Just figured out how to make the suspension visuals works properly - ie swinging in an arc with the suspension arms, rather than the somewhat unrealistic sliding joint most have. Looking seriously sweet and can't wait to release. Had a few hours in the car today to daydream and have some (what I hope will be) kickass ideas for animations on the driver which I'll get to shortly. Plasma rails, huh? Love the idea! I believe might be done with particle emitters. However, to create them I think you need the paid-for version of Unity, plus I have no idea how it's done. I'll keep an eye out for tips on how you might go about that, though I believe we are in uncharted territory as far as KSP modding goes.

Perfect, that's brilliant info. I think I know whats wrong, will cast an eye over the code later. I'll hopefully post a model release later this evening too.

Hmmm, that's interesting about the undock, redock. Great that you're testing. What do you mean by moving the logic to a docking port? Peter, can we add add a print() statement bound to a gui button that will dump the current state of all your plugin variables to the log? Might be really handy while people are testing.

Cool, I'll commit and sync in the morning. By the way, I was thinking of making the rails glow after firing like overheating engines do: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/25023-Emissive-tutorial If you can script it, I'll set it up on the model Also, how about a small (3 secs? Or even configurable?) countdown before launch and an abort button? Could put an animated bit or two in as it's preparing to fire. I was thinking the loops closing over the front side, sequenced top to bottom would look really cool, and being completely clear of longer payloads while loading would be no bad thing.

Missed this. All sounds good! Realised I messed up the scale in the export - now fixed. Added docking ring mesh to the rails, split the bottom off. I've done the texture unwrap and made some crude textures, but have to rethink how I apply them. Will post to Git once I'm happier with it all. Any objections to me moving it into utility with all the other worky bits rather than structural? I keep thinking the reload has gone wrong and its not showing up! Of course, I'm looking in the wrong section...

Hmmm, that's an interesting point. You can use raycasters to judge distance I believe - this is essentially how the wheelcollider functions. (I've clearly read too many Unity docs!) The method would be something like: Init { Find the length of the vessel Create a raycaster at each end } Update { Monitor wheels to check if they are all off the ground. //wheel.hit, I believe. If so, apply available RCS and SAS to rotate the vehicle so the raycaster values match. //This is probably the hardest part to code if you're going to prevent oscillations and over-correction!! } Direction of travel must be accessible as a vector somewhere, I'm sure. Check in the correct plane, correct accordingly. Looks like a whole heap of fun!

Cheers! Now it's actually working I'll start a proper WIP release thread. Hell yes! I have a few things on my list: 1) Make the plugin an extension to ModuleWheel. This will mean it applies to all wheels by default, rather than having to .cfg edit the custom module name in to call the plugin. I think this can be done with an override, though I'm not sure. 2) Stability control. Yep, absolutely. There is example code in the Unity docs, so it's a case of getting the code to find all wheels on a craft, pair them up by looking at their position and applying it appropriately. Another tweakable here. 3) Traction control could be quite cool. Have to look into how to interrogate whether a wheel is slipping, but there is some example code around for modifying torque I think. 4) Anti-flip. Would be seriously cool be be able to fire RCS and use SAS appropriately if more than half the wheels come off the ground. Need to be really careful as this could lead to some stability problems at high speed in itself! 5) There is NOOOOOO rule five 6) Definitely tweakable buttons for all of this, though attachable to action groups. 7) This is a hard one. Smooth out the wheels steering. Does my head in the way they just flip left to right instantaneously. The example car games implement it so much better (and again, working code examples)! Also, make wheels steer in proportion to how far they are from the center of the vehicle. Be great if you're up for it

Wow, that's a pretty crazy bit of work there! Glad you like the models Cheers for that link, pina_coladas, might well come in handy.