Captain_Brian

Now THAT'S what I'm talking about! Hopefully I can mod out the explosion sound as that got grating just listening to it in Scott Manley's video.

Thanks, looks like I'm going to be creating a mod for this based on a blend of karbonite and Interstellar kicked up to 11.

Honestly I see this as just more work for the player, but not necessarily more fun. Let's look at different types of resources and how they can be interesting/fun: ElectricCharge Varied ways of collecting. Solar panels bring interesting design decisions on their locations, and risks due to lack of sunlight or gforces destroying them. Solar panels bring player interaction due to having to deploy them and remember to retract at certain times. Multiple systems rely on the resource, and thus have interesting consequences when the resource is depleted. Fuel Basis for all design decisions in rocketry. Very interesting design decisions due to calculations needed to get to different planets, the use of staging, and payload/mission considerations Fuel routing/staging adds another layer in the complexity and gameplay options of rocket design. Interesting and fun. Oxidizer is a bit pointless from a game play standpoint. Arguably doesn't need to be represented and could be abstracted due to it always being tied to fuel usage. The increased realism is fun in its own way though. Monopropellant Fuel with a routing independent design, which allows for different rocket designs than Fuel based propulsion. Adds additional gameplay options due to it being an emergency alternative to Fuel. Adds a different control option in the form of thruster control. By adding a new control type, this resource also removes that control if the fuel is exhausted, adding a type of risk and mission planning that is fun for the player. Mods ============================================== Now onto the systems mods have introduced: Life Support Basically boils down to having to haul more tonnage\equipment\supplies for all your missions. Does not (to my knowledge) add any variety to the actual gameplay. Seem to all boil down to additional resources that must be hauled along for the mission. Some do add complex systems of interdependency, (CO2 generation, waste disposal, etc) except that at the end of the day it boils down to needing additional tonnage without actually adding interesting design considerations. Add limitations to missions, due to a lack of resources/time. (Kerbals die from starvation trying to do long orbits around the sun.) Alternate Fuels (Karbonite/Kethane) Adds a certain amount of gameplay\fun due to being able to scan and hunt for new resources. Extends mission times due to finding\refining the fuels. Adds\promotes a basebuilding dynamic for mining the resources. At the end of the day, not particularly "interesting" due to a relative lack of scarcity. Resources are usually pretty abundant in these mods, and even without the mods you could just park giant fuel rockets at different areas of the solar system for refueling. How can we improve this? ======================================== Well, lets look at the most fun systems in existence for KSP, the STOCK ones. They seem to be the most fun because they allow for interesting random situations, in-mission problem-solving, and design considerations for the player. That is what we need more of, and that is what all the current resource mods lack. Just spit-balling here, maybe this would help make resource mods more interesting and fun: Resource mods Add some randomization that can help create interesting situations for the player. Perhaps a random chance of hitting gas pockets, causing an explosion at the point of drilling? Could have different magnitudes such as a small one that just tips over the craft or a large one that blows a chunk out of it. This could promote design considerations for the player to design a more explosion resistant drilling craft. Add more incentive to gather the new resources (kethane\karbonite). Fuel is great and all, but in the end a trip to the gas station isn't particularly fun or interesting. Perhaps have it be a better fuel than the stock type, make it worth the work the player has to do to get it. Perhaps it allows for gameplay that wouldn't otherwise be possible. (Like a specialized but rare fuel that allows for warp travel or near light travel or something. Make the player have to hunt for it, but make the payoff be fun and worth it.) Add scarcity without making it a pain for players to gather resources. If the fuel is everywhere then it's too easy, if it is extremely hard to get to then it kinda defeats the purpose of the mod. Maybe a commonly found but low efficiency fuel, and a rare but extremely efficient fuel. Add interesting player interaction and design considerations. Perhaps the fuel must be maintained by a device that uses electrical current, and if the current is lost than the fuel tanks have a likelihood of becoming unstable and exploding. Perhaps allow the fuel to be sold for a lot of money in order to allow bases to be used for generating profits in career mode. Life Support Add life support systems only if they are going to effect gameplay in interesting ways. Perhaps instead of just dying when starved, kerbals just go insane and act erratically until they get fed. You could have insanity chance based on bravery stat. Add random events and interesting ways for players to deal with them. Lets be honest, the main reason everyone loves the idea of life support mods are because of Apollo 13. If there isn't a way to do "failure is not an option" and mcguiver your way out of something, then it just isn't nearly as interesting. Perhaps add ways to scrap\dismantle certain systems to get others working? Maybe the success chance is dependent on the stupidity stat.

Sorry about that, basically I'm looking for any mods that add EXCITEMENT. I'm looking for a mod that is basically almost cheating but hopefully with some significant risks. A few examples: Perhaps a highly efficient and insanely powerful engine that flames out under 99% thrust, forcing you to keep the pedal to the metal and likely overshooting all your targets? Or maybe a mod that introduces a dense asteroid field in the solar system that you'd need to navigate using the game's newtonian physics? Maybe even a mod that adds crazy sci-fi-esque maneuvers such as Chriton's slingshot maneuver from the pilot episode of FarScape (Extreme speed increase when grazing a planetary atmosphere?) Really, just anything exciting.

I've played the heck out of this great game for the past few months, yet I've hit a wall where I'm having trouble finding the fun in the things I've done a 1,000 times over. Anyone got any mod recommendations that are a little... crazy? After building hundreds of massive rocket ships to get to other planets, I'm now getting more interested in the idea of building small, but ridiculously overpowered spaceships with low part counts. I modified a few of the rocket engines from the Karbonite mod and had a BLAST with them. (Upped the efficiency in Karbonite usage, and dramatically increased the Air storage of the air scoops so that I can use them for short periods in space before having to dip back down into the atmosphere to refill them.) But I'm really looking for a whole package that's designed around this sort of thing. I'm basically looking for the power of giant rocket parts, but much smaller and without the requirements for massive tanks of fuel. Some varety in fuel\power methods would be cool too, kind of like how I made the air scoops viable in space travel but need refilling in atmosphere. (It's just fun and thrilling to need to zoom through the atmosphere to refill, yet take care not to aero brake to the point of de-orbiting.) Is there anything like this, or am I going to need to modify the stock parts myself?

Does this work with .24? Has it been recompiled? Thanks!

Is it here yet!?

That's what I'm trying to figure out. Is the update OUT or is just ALLLLLLLLMOST OUT?

Technically due to part count, yes very slightly. The idea is that there *ARE* parachutes on each of your stages to allow for recovery, rather than forcing everyone to plaster parachutes on all of their designs.

Currently with 0.24 you will be able to get cash back for recovered parts attached to your ship when you land, however you won't get any cash for boosters or stages that may or may not have landed successfully. So I'm suggesting the following: 1. Have any parts that were properly shed and undamaged from staging on Kerbol just be automatically recovered with a random chance of success. 2. The chance of success would be based on: Part Count - More complex stages would be much harder to land without damage. Biome - Mountains would have an extremely low chance of success, but oceans would have a much higher chance. 3. The calculation would still be done to see how close the landing pad is from where you're staging to adjust the recovery cost %. 4. All parts recovered this way should still have a % deduction in recovery amount received since recovery in this way is likely to do more wear and tear to the parts than if they returned home attached to the command module. Also this would reward players who are doing difficult builds where they return with most\all of their craft. [EDIT] The idea is that the parachutes are abstracted and assumed to already be on the parts being staged, rather than forcing players to put parachutes all over their designs. All that adding parachutes into the mix does is add parts and labor for no benefit other than already abstracted calculations.

*SNIP* Making a thread instead as this idea got bigger and bigger in my head.

I had the same thought about this and the "maximumRecoverableMass" value, but the problem is all this gets you is having to modify all your builds to put tons of parachutes all over the place like regex said. That said, I like the idea of recovering the parts, but I don't like the idea of all the extra parts to do so.

Task 1: Successfully land on a planet without using any engines, wings, or parachutes. Task 2: Successfully return to Kerbol.

I read it all in every clip I could. It is HORRIBLE for the most part at least. That being said, I think if you reduce it to just a single sentence and cleaned up the procedural generation logic, it could actually be pretty good. I might actually make a mod to clean it up after I get my fill of the new contract system.

Every time I see "Bad Gateway" I imagine a network admin hitting a web server with a rolled up newspaper and saying "Bad gateway! Bad!"

I only NEED two: -Kerbal Engineer Redux -Enhanced Navball Can't play without them. I need KER to design rockets and for the handy display of stage time and other data like time to apoapsis that you only find in map view. I need Enhanced Navball to actually read the Navball, otherwise I can't tell what's on it.

I voted hard to build but useless, but the fact of the matter is that they're easy to build but useless. They just take too long to drive to different biomes, making them useless unless you have MechJeb to control the rover while you do something else.

I'm finding the Arduino Leonardo out of stock, but they do have a Arduino UNO starter kit that includes USB, does this look like it will work or be worth the cost ($80)? Likewise, should I get this book?

Funny thing is my laptop helped me figure out that the persistent debris was causing the problem. I installed the game fresh on that laptop and copied over my large 600+ part spaceship and was amazed/perplexed at the fact that it actually performed better than my better desktop pc. After looking into it I realized the only difference was all the persistent debris. (I only have a couple of satellites and bases.) 25 is great for me, cleaned it up and I still get post launch debris I can either recover or ignore. (I figure I'll be doing a lot more recovering when the budget update comes out.)

I know, it's just tedious and i didn't think that over time it would cause a performance issue. Don't really see a reason to keep over 25 around anyway so it works out for me either way.

Change Persistent Debris to 25 or 0 in the general settings. My FPS went from 5 to 60. I had 250 leftover rocket debris from prior launches being tracked and it was dragging my machine down. Figured I'd share the tip in case it helps anyone else.

I wish I had screenshots of this. I was doing an orbital test of a newly build spaceship, and as a normal part of my tests I go EVA to test out retrieval of science materials to make sure everything is easy to get to. Well, I EVA, and as soon as the kerbal lets go of the ladder, suddenly the camera switches to orbital view, completely disorientating me. I tried to adjust and move the kerbal back to the command pod, but as soon as I got close the camera would switch constantly from orbital to reentry views, completely disorientating me again. Apparently I must have been in such a low orbital altitude that the camera couldn't decide which view to use. I compensate incorrectly, and very quickly my kerbal is drifting away from the spaceship. I'm on the dark side of the planet. There are no lights on the spaceship. I'm probably only about 100 feet away from the spaceship, but all I see is the blackness of planet kerbin. After awhile of trying my kerbal ran out of RCS and I'm sure hours later asphyxiated a horrible death. Now, I always do liftoffs during the day, and only spacewalk with the lights on...

So, 3 to 4 copies of all the instruments? But if you can just take the data and reset the smaller instruments then why take all the other copies of them? Not to mention having them all attached to the command pod makes retrieval extremely easy.

I got bored with Prison Architect. Once you build a prison enough times there's just not a lot to do and I wasn't able to find an endgame to it so it just sort of drags on and on. There really just isn't enough variety to building the prisons and the game gets too easy once you know what you're doing. KSP just never gets old for me, and I've still only been exploring within Kerbin SOI. I mostly love building ships, landers, and rovers though, exploring with them is just icing on the cake.