tater

Given the nature of KSP, that it is "realistic" rockets, not Star Wars "airplanes in space," I think it is fair to want as much realism as possible as long as gameplay/fun is not compromised. "Different" doesn't mean "un-fun," BTW. Where that line resides is clearly debatable by reasonable people, but I think the goal---as much realism as possible within the limits of good gameplay is a good one. Its also, I think, easier to limit realism after the fact than it is to add it on after unrealistic modeling is done in the first place.

Have you tried the tutorials in game?

The dev build of KJR fixes the problem, it's linked in the KJR thread.

Adding more "realism" is neither 100% good, nor 100% bad for gameplay. Sometimes it is good, sometimes it might be bad. Ion engine thrust should be lower, for example. The reason it is not is not dumbing down realism for gameplay, it's that the game engine will not allow them to model constant-thrust trajectories, which is the entire point/reality of ion engines. If they could, you'd stretch a maneuver node for an ion rocket, and it would create for you a spiral instead of an ellipse. Gameplay difficulty change? ZERO. You'd have a novel way to maneuver. Yipee! (they'd just need a good interface. Check a box for "constant thrust" trajectory, and have a slider for how you have it throttled---it would probably need to check that spiral vs total fuel, and downgrade the throttling such that the spiral ends with a normal coning when fuel is exhausted (if you stretch too far)) Reentry damage is implied by the game, read the lander can descriptions. I've turned a couple people on to KSP, and they all assume reentry damage is a thing. They have to be told otherwise by me. Take life support. That is a difficulty increase, IMO, and far more than either FAR or DRE to use mod examples. It is more of a legitimate difficulty change than anything in the current career sliders, frankly---which is where life support should be if added, as a difficulty option, because it puts a time limit on everything.

It's disingenuous to make the claim that "realism in video-game is absolutely linked to difficulty" if that link is only when taken to an extreme that we will never get to, or also if lack of realism can also be linked to bad gameplay. Heck, we have not even characterized where on some imaginary scale of realism KSP lies, or what the target point would be for "realism" advocates. Sure, realism at some level might have negative gameplay trade offs, but I don't think you can possibly link them to realism in direction. "Low" realism can refer to any arbitrary rules of physics added that are contrary to reality. If some force were added to KSP that ships would hit like a wall, but only in some narrow regime frequently passed by players, that would be entirely "unrealistic," but would also result in a game experience that players would rightfully perceive as constant, random destruction. Say any time the player is moving exactly 101m/s at some atmospheric pressure greater than X, the rocket explodes. You would learn to throttle down at so many meters above the pad or explode every time. Very unrealistic, 100% predictable, very difficult (few tools) obviously un-fun. It is possible to construct virtually infinite examples where such arbitrary game design WRT reality results in unambiguously difficult/crappy gameplay. So a general characterization of difficulty in games scaling to "realism" is entirely unjustified unless you can demonstrate that the finite increases in difficulty due to realism exceed arbitrarily large increases in difficulty possible by randomly changing physics. I realize that this would not be the goal of any sensible game designer, but we are dealing with a blanket statement, "absolutely linked to difficulty." At best you could say that at some point in a continuum of less to more realistic in terms of simulation, gameplay likely suffers as difficulty increases. I'd not disagree with such a statement. Where that line is, OTOH, I am entirely unsure. Fundamentally in KSP, we are talking about what to most players is a "black box." As a new player in August, I absolutely expected my rockets to blow up if I did something idiotic design wise, and I only unlearned adding nosecones after reading this forum (I didn't learn they were pointless from experience, as I ALWAYS added them because it seemed insane not to). The same applies to reentry. I only reentered capsules, alone. I now have FAR and DRE added and I notice almost no difference in gameplay whatsoever. I said someplace in here that if 0.91 came out and the devs did an experiment and threw in FAR with KJR added (rockets have always been too wobbly, IMO), I'd wager no new players would notice, and existing players would just say, "yeah, they changed the soup, alright." It would be different, particularly for aircraft, but I'm unsure how those players would characterize "difficulty." Many might observe lower dv to orbit and actually report the game got easier, don't you think? TL, DR: Perceived gameplay difficulty might be related to "realism," but it is difficult to impossible to make a broad statement that as "realism" goes up, so does difficulty.

This is the discussion I'm sort of looking for. So far I managed orbit (manned) with no mod parts---I only have PF, but it's career, and I've not gotten to the point of needing fairings yet. It was tricky enough with 1.25m parts that I'm assuming that any Mun attempt will be a Kerbin orbit rendezvous affair, with at least 2 launches with 2.5m parts unless I make a 2.5m critter that looks like a Delta IV heavy.

It seems rather unlikely that anyone could do anything outside of physics range in MP, as you get much beyond that, and you start entering time compression situations.

I agree the mk1-2 needs a heat shield part since it has a hatch.

What about RF with stockalike? I was thinking the lighter engines might help a little. I started a career to test, got to orbit, etc, but clearly considerably trickier than stock to push the career forward (I refuse to do kerbin science except from orbit ). Right now I have 64X, FAR/KJR/DRE/KIDS. Undecided on Snacks (you can make it so they die in the snacks.cfg, which I do) or IFLS. Trying to keep overhead down on machine. I have nothing else on this install.

I want physics to tell me what I can build. Strike that, I can build anything, anyway. I want physics to tell me if it gets to orbit, or explodes.

What setting would make sense for KIDS?

Cool. While I "get" TACLS, I think as long as the abstraction has around the right total consumables per astronaut/day, a simpler system is better if for no other reason than the odd looking parts.

I'd be interested in a minimal install for this which works best. I have FAR/DRE/KJR/KIDS in there now. Thinking about IF life support. Anything else I should think about? 5m parts?

Massively drop the default science returns, then make the science skill a multiplier. Instead of a munar soil return being 120, make it 12, and skill 5 makes it 60.

Yeah, the cash is weird, but it honestly depends on the time frame. KSP needs time based mechanics. 60k would not be bad for a year, or even a quarter, perhaps. Right now, you can clickfest "contracts" and do the same missions multiple times in a day if you felt like it.

I think this is it (just the dll): View Raw I found it here: https://github.com/ferram4/Kerbal-Joint-Reinforcement follow the top link with GameData/KerbalJoint… and dig down a few clicks. It fixes it, I ran my test setup.

Ferram, since mine is pretty reproducible, let me know if there is anything I can do or test for you.

Yeah, this needs fixing. Fixing this, AND adding whatever is needed for better rovers seems like the best bet.

I like this. The current paradigm of "do whatever you like" with "here, take money to do this dumb thing" nature of contracts is not me "steering" the program the way I want… everything gets unlocked so quickly there is no sense of making a choice for a program goal, then working towards it.

No idea. I just noticed a new version of MM (2.5.8) was out, and I used that in the same test above just in case that was an issue… stuck again, and exit to space center, come back… and BOOM.

Slight tangent, but showing how UI matters, and how you can teach players (the game aspects, and/or physics). They don't want to add dv numbers to the VAB, apparently. Fine. How about Werner in the VAB has a desk or something you can click on. There is a white board, with him gesticulating, and on the white board is a parabola, crudely drawn. At the top is scrawled an altitude. Not perfect, not the best ou could possibly reach if you flew a perfect launch, just a rounded off to the nearest 5-10km height based upon the current stack. If it has roughly enough for orbit, the crude parabola leads into a crude circle. If you can reach another body, the drawing is a crude Kerbin, with an orbit drawn, and a swooping arrow with the name of the body in question at the point (or a list for the same gross dv range). Lets the new players have some idea what they are making.

Let me know if there is anything else i can do for you. Was unsure if persistent or quick save was best (I'm unsure if they are different formats). This was sandbox, and the only vessel as well, I tried to keep is as simple as possible.

Other than being spammed with too many such contracts, I'm not sure I have a problem with be contracted to add to existing stations.

Thanks. Could not see the green text very well, lol. I took my test career game that was becoming unplayable (every Nth craft was having locked docking ports), and yanked KJR, then reloaded by save… works fine. On the plus side, some earlier explosions from this problem created some interesting rescue operations.

As every proponent of having things be as realistic as feasible within a game says in every one of these threads, no one is asking for "true realism." The "you'd have to be NASA," or "you'd have to model bathroom breaks for Jeb," or "you'd have to model the office workers in the admin building standing around waiting to go home" straw men arguments need to just stop. No one is arguing for what anyone characterizing the "realism crowd" says they are. Squad is removing the awful, placeholder atmosphere model, that is a given. their goal is to have it more realistic than it is now, also a given. Many of us want them to do it as well as they can within the limits of having the game run smoothly, that's it. Another straw man. OP is arguing nothing of the sort. One, the thread is about why people have the (entirely unsubstantiated) idea that somehow which algorithm is used to calculate drag---that no one can see---is assumed to "reduce fun" if it is arbitrarily choice A over choice B. Two, OP is right, it's a false dichotomy in general (otherwise a flight sim with no gravity would always be more fun than one with gravity, for example). I'd wager that Squad could drop in FAR (minus the graphs and stuff that lets you know it's there)., tell everyone they opted for "fun" at the expense of doing all they could do… and none of you would even notice. Yes, you'd notice the atmosphere was changed, but I bet you'd have more fun than if they told you they added FAR in.