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Whitecat106

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Posts posted by Whitecat106

  1. Hello everyone,

    Sorry Ive been gone for a while! Took a break from modding for a few days, should be back on track now. Ahh no fear everyone, I wont be incorporating anything else into this specific mod release apart from the planned features on the main page, my poll is just to see what I should move onto next since this is going to be a pretty low maintenance mod (the actually orbit altering system works all the way down to KSP 0.18 so I doubt it will change soon) once the UI and stationkeeping is complete :sticktongue:

    I have decided that I will instead of using background processing (a bit of a memory hog), to simply use a catch up system for removing vessel resources (removing monoprop on the first frame of the vessel being switched to whilst in the background calculating when and if the monopropellant has been depleted from logging the known start quantity, the time interval and the decay rate (which is already run for every vessel simultaneously)). I have not yet started this new system but by this time next week I hope to have a working test version! :)

    I hope there aren't any major bugs popping up (I have not seen any anyway).

    Enjoy!

  2. Hi guys, sorry I have been out of touch for afew days, I will hopefully bugfix the Gemini-II mission tonight (On a mobile right now), if anyone else is stuck on this please try and play though some of the Russian missions in the meantime (sorry for the trouble!).

    By the way, does anyone know how maculators first point could be achieved? I'm stumped as to how to set contracts to a specific vessel and prevent this vessel from completing other contracts without making contracts exist one at a time (even though this may only be an issue for the early missions (1960's era)). I also intend on adding the runway requirements to the X-15 flights and the Shuttle ALT flights (Maybe with the STS missions but these could be too tricky especially using only gliding shuttles).

    Enjoy! The next update will be a bug fix for Gemini-II - thanks Duna! The following update will add runway requirements and begin adding more detail and bugfixes to the pack. (Based on the current sway of the poll). :)

  3. The Gemini-I has trait = Pilot, which requires a pilot on board (even though max crew is 0). This makes the contract pretty much impossible, afaict. i removed "trait = Pilot" and was able to complete the mission.

    also, did they not test parachute/recovery with this mission? the mission calls for destruction of vessel, but i'd feel more at ease sending kerbals up if this mission also tested recovery!

    Also, i think you have some fancy unicode emdashes instead of hyphens when denoting date ranges; at least on Windows these don't display so you just get "19581960." if you can't recall which missions those are, i can look them up.

    cheers!

    Thanks Duna, I have fixed this now, the bug was also present for Gemini-II, I don't think this should pop up again (atleast not for a while!)

    They only actually tested the parachute recovery with Gemini-II, infact holes were drilled into the heat-shield of Gemini-I (if memory serves me) so that it would burn up :P

    I don't know what you mean about the dates? Are you talking about the descriptions of the missions if so then I will fix these for the next update! Eww unicode.. :(

    In the meantime I have released a hotfix version onto Kerbal stuff so no body gets too stuck! Enjoy :)

  4. Thanks everyone! I am slowly working through things but I am pretty stumped at the moment :P If anyone could offer their coding help with this whole resource consumption thing it would be greatly appreciated! Infact if anyone can help I will make sure that they get a mention in a contract in my contract pack! :D

    But I seem to be going in circles at the moment, really trying to make this resource handling work but I cant even get past making active vessels consume resources no matter the background ones, I understand that there is a way of doing this with ProtoPartModule snapshots but this is beyond my programming at the moment :( So yes.. Help wanted.. Needed.. Begged for!

    I plan on making both the resource consumption and the decay its self be toggle-able within the UI. As for N-Body physics I do want to eventually dab into this but at the moment I will finish this mod.. With some help hopefully..

    In the meantime untill I either find a burst of inspiration or someone willing to help out with this resource handling I am playing around with Solar Flares and their effect on vessels (Faulty modules, drained resources, kerbal damage, part damage (extreme cases)). As for Lagrange points, if you see my video on the first thread and look closely at the orbit of Kerbin, you may see three points (L3, L4 and L5) in a nice 60,180,300 resonant position around Kerbin (but this is far from perfect or releasable yet).

    So back to the matter at hand, anyone interested in helping out? If so send me a PM and we can sort something out! In the meantime I may release an intermediate version with a fix for the ugly UI buttons. Enjoy! :)

    Edit: Notice the plea for help theme? :wink:

  5. Glad to hear, so i just delete all of the old stuff and get your update? And it wont break anything?

    Sorry its late! Yes just copy and replace any files, I have not modified many of the early contracts so there should not be any issues really, if you want to be safe I would recommend possibly completing any of my contracts you have currently active (if possible - if not then it shouldn't be a problem anyway!) Have fun! :)

  6. Amazing. You will also have resource consumption (like power) being calculated constantly even when vessel is not in use by the player? That would be great!

    Walter

    Thanks! Yes I am working on this now, the next update will include a MonoPropellant drain at a rate proportional to the decay rate for all vessels in the background or active, this has been done before with many Life Support mods so this should not be too tricky to implement :)

  7. Okay guys, just a quick update, I have included the Explorer Program and the Helios Program and have experimented with some lower Reputation rewards (I agree.. they were a tad OP). The next update will focus on the ISS and the altering of all reputation rewards! (Nearly at 400!) Sorry for the slower progress as of late, I have been focusing on my new orbital decay mod - any realism fans might want to check it out! Help is wanted too so any plugin makers with some spare time who wouldn't mind helping me out should drop me a PM - (Ill make you a part of this contract pack as a passenger Kerbal on any mission you want if you do! :D)

    Enjoy everyone! :)

  8. Well I too noticed, the reputation gain is quite "good", but since I play with no revert flights and had some "Issues" with my tourist missions, im quite happy the way it is.

    You get good money, much reputation and a bit of science, the perfect combination for a career with a lot of testing.

    Only thing i would change:

    Since there are litteraly a ton of missions, why not make some unique and failable? Like the Lunar impacts (I'm not much further in the story so those are the only ones i came across wich fit my idea)

    Bind them to the ship you put on the launchpad.

    I see what you mean about the reputation rewards I had not changed many of these since the first few STS missions I made so this will just be a case of editing each file with an adjusted value, I hope to get round to this soon! I think I neglected these since I personally think the reputation system is somewhat broken (I have never managed to reach 100% rep ever, being hung at 99%). But I will make the necessary edits possibly this afternoon to balance out the contracts a bit more.

    I have tried to bind some contracts to specific ships (and I believe these work with the later STS missions) but some earlier and later ones may not have this in place, I will be editing the missions for Cassini, Voyager, New Horizons etc. so that these are 'failable': in the respect that they would only be repeatable after a LONG time once failed. I see what you mean about the Luna impacts (some contracts such as those of the Ranger program; I have excluded since their real life counterparts failed to complete their mission). The only issue here is that with the way contract configurator manages progressing contracts, to complete one the former (if stated) must be completed otherwise the contracts would appear out of order. (E.g, Although some of the Mariner missions failed I thought it easier to include all just so that you do not suddenly jump from Mariner 2 to Mariner 10).

    Balancing is varied across the pack, (only with Science and Funds at the moment). I based the funds rewards on the funds cost of a vessel that would be required (e.g I based the STS fund costs and rewards on the type of missions (cargo or science) and these were done using about 1.2x the cost of the shuttle (using the CSS shuttle as a model). Of course with some Soyuz missions (since there are literally 80 of them) the funds steadily decrease as time goes on since funds will be accumulated with other active missions (Such as Venera or Vega).

    I did want to lock missions so that a Soviet/Russian mission must not be concurrent with a Nasa mission (especially early on) and I may well change this but for this testing stage (since I doubt anyone has even got 1/4 through the pack yet!) I did not want a bug in one mission to completely derail the whole pack preventing progression. (e.g a bug in Soyuz-21 would only cause issues for future Russian missions (Mir, Salyut), this bug would then only affect the other contract programs at for example STS-63 the first Shuttle Mir mission) This gives me time to fix the bug and allows everyone to keep playing in the meantime; although since most of the Early missions have been debugged now I will adjust the order of the Mercury and Vostoks.

  9. Im playing this since a few days, now i going for my first mission to eve, great pack.

    I saw it is on its way to ckan, but for some reason you stopped it?! Im just curious; is it something you can fix or will we have to wait for ckan a bit longer?

    Ahh well I am just learning CKAN (never used it before) so I am just getting my head around the installation process, hopefully a CKAN release will be included with the next update V 1.2.4 either tomorrow or Thursday (probably tomorrow). So hopefully not much longer! Enjoy your trip to Eve! May it be the first of many.. :sticktongue:

  10. Thanks for all the comments guys, development is going well, I am currently working on resource management using Background Processing. If all goes well I will release version 0.1.0 with resource handling (monoprop for the moment) for Station Keeping vessels, and a fixed image for the toolbar button (why did Ksp 1.0 break .png's with the new .dds so badly? :(). After this I plan on making the UI all nice and pretty and changing the decay formula to a more realistic one (to be precise this one here).

    Enjoy everyone! :)

    Oh by the way, as for RO/RSS compatibility I have purposely altered the 'decay multiplier' slider in the settings to allow for the decay rates to be reduced. (Reducing this from 1 - Default to 0.1 will make the decay rates more realistic for that RSS feel).

    With the new decay formulas I will release an RSS and a Stock version separately.

  11. KSP Orbital Decay

    Introduction

    Hello everyone, Whitecat106 here creator of the Historic Missions Contract Pack and I wish to share with you an early version of my new project. I have been working on this for the better part of a month after I finally had a break through in the code - as a result of months of tinkering! Some mods in the past have come so close to this but none actually produced a viable working version... well until now...

    What does it do?

    * On rails and off rails orbital decay for any vessel around any celestial body (except Kerbol.. - working on it), this decay is determined by the altitude above the body, the mass of the body and the density of the body atmosphere (if present).

    * On rails and off rails Station Keeping for any vessel that has a Station Keeping module (currently included in all parts with a command module - Will be changed later). This Station-Keeping is suitable for integration with Remote Tech since it fixes vessels at a certain altitude and prevents floating point drifts over time.

    * Estimated impact times are given for each vessel.

    * All of the above work during time-warp! :D

    I can already hear everyone screaming "No this isn't possible!", well...this video shows some of the features currently present and some orbital decay in action:

    Planned features:

    * Resource handling for On-rails and Off-rails vessels with a Station Keeping module active. - Possibly using Background Processing.

    * A more realistic decay curve; this version uses a square function of decay mapping rather than an exponential differential function. The current model is equivalent to approximately 2x real life (~4km/month) but this is changeable in the UI.

    * More accurate decay estimates; this version has a low accuracy due to the previous point, especially due to the differences in how decay is handled On and Off rails (active and non active vessels).

    * Drag around Kerbol - Only removed due to the extremely small decay values occurring (1*10^-60 which even breaks the float container).

    * Better warnings for decaying vessels & a better UI altogether (If anyone can help with UI's drop me a PM :D).

    * Possibly a separate mod for Station Keeping more devoted to orbital precision than integration with decay (more useful for Remote Tech users).

    You can check out some of my earlier ideas on my Ksp blog.

    Known Issues:

    * The UI button does not display correctly (probably a dds/png issue) again any advice would be really appreciated.

    * The UI is ugly, especially in the Tracking station scene...

    * Decay estimates are off, they do not currently factor in the inverse square relationship of altitude to decay therefore they are only point to point estimates, (which are especially broken during high timewarp).

    * Stationkeeping uses no fuel (see above).

    * Hitting vessels into planets at super high timewarp and super high speeds (literally 50km/s deltaV) can cause issues (to prevent intense calculations this mod currently only updates decay values per second so if a vessel is traveling fast enough the code sometimes cannot keep up).

    Download:

    Dropbox: | Release | Source |

    This mod requires a recent version of Module Manager.

    (I will be moving to KerbalStuff for version 0.1.0)

    Help Wanted:

    I am, by far, not a programmer and the code as it stands (although working) is very messy...

    The next big hurdle is resource consumption with background and foreground(active) vessels, one that I am struggling with. I am in the process of integrating Background Processing but if anyone with plugin modding experience could lend a hand It would be greatly appreciated. Especially if you know how to make a nice looking UI and have knowledge coding with mods that involve resource consuption for off rails vessels (Such as TAC, Background processing or Karbonite).

    If you fit the criteria and wouldn't mind having a look through the source code and/or giving me some suggestions/modifications to help with the aforementioned features please comment below or send me a PM! Thanks guys! :)

    License:

    This code is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 (CC BY-NC-SA 3.0) creative commons license. However I will be making this less restrictive as time goes on and this mod develops into a version fit for the main release thread.

    Enjoy! Whitecat106 :D

  12. Sputnik 1 Mission

    It seems that there is some bug, the last mission parameters fail to get accomplished, 1st the V-2 rocket destroyed wasn't recognized, now this:

    http://i.imgur.com/gjJcgNC.png

    maybe some code glitch in the last mission parameter?

    Edit: Probably it has to do with periapsis altitude, it's under 215km... Maybe giving min apoapsis and periapsis would be easier to understand the contract, just a minor improvement suggestion :)

    Ahh I see what you mean yes, I had assumed that since the vessel reached an orbit around Earth (thus satisfying the first two requirements) that the altitude would only be relevant for any given instance and would be fulfilled once the vessel reached the altitude; rather than the periapsis height having to be that value. Okay this should be pretty easy to fix, Ill see what I can do this evening! :) I will change this for the Regular version as well to avoid confusion.

  13. Request or Thoughts anyway...

    Gotta say I'm loving this so far. Had a thought / suggestion - have you reached out or maybe thought about reaching out to the Cacteye Telescope mod team and seeing about integrating optional Hubble missions? From deployment of to servicing of , I think you'd just need Cacteye and KAS/KIS . Just a thought.

    I had thought about this, however as much as I would love to include and connect these two I don't want to constrict people into having to have a certain mod installed (mostly because of the idea that all of the contracts in this pack can be played with or without mods) I thought that instead I might (...I will eventually get round to...) just make a list of recommended mods with their links for each Program in the contract pack. That way people can decide how they want to play out missions like the Hubble deployment and servicing (for instance, some people may prefer Tarsier Space Technologies Telescope parts to Cacteye) and not force them to use a certain mod for the contract (especially problematic with Windows RAM cap). The idea of optional integration seems like a great idea though! In fact this could be easily done and so I may include this in a future update.

    KAS and KIS may at some point become dependencies since their potential for this pack is pretty impressive (Not only recreating the Historic missions but what about the mission specific EVA's too!? *Cue Inception music*)

    I am soon (by 7pm GMT) to release a fixed version onto KerbalStuff (this fixes the name bugs from the RSS version (thanks RickKermen!)). I have also removed the requirement to destroy the V-2 rockets (this was causing some issues).

    EDIT:

    The RSS version is now up!

  14. Downloading now! :D Feedback soon...

    - - - Updated - - -

    :( no contracts appear at all, not on my savegame or starting a new game, any ideas what could be?

    Seems to be related to planet names, log example:

    "[ERR 22:22:09.172] ContractConfigurator.OrbitFactory: CONTRACT_TYPE 'Apollo-XI', PARAMETER 'OrbitB' of type 'Orbit': Error parsing targetBody

    [EXC 22:22:09.173] ArgumentException: 'Mun' is not a valid CelestialBody.

    ContractConfigurator.ConfigNodeUtil.ParseCelestialBodyValue (System.String celestialName)

    ContractConfigurator.ExpressionParser.CelestialBodyParser.ParseIdentifier (ContractConfigurator.ExpressionParser.Token token)

    ContractConfigurator.ExpressionParser.ExpressionParser`1[T].ParseVarOrIdentifier (ContractConfigurator.ExpressionParser.Token token)

    ContractConfigurator.ExpressionParser.ExpressionParser`1[CelestialBody].ParseSimpleStatement[CelestialBody] ()

    Rethrow as Exception: Error parsing statement.

    Error occurred near '*':

    Mun

    ...* <-- HERE"

    My full log file here: http://www.filedropper.com/ksp_1

    I hope it helps.

    It would appear I forgot that the planets in RSS have been renamed! :blush: Okay well in that case I will repair this tomorrow and release an RSS version then! Sorry for the trouble!

  15. So if I install this and contract config update it will not break an existing savegame?

    It should not do any damage no, If you want to be safe then I would recommend making a copy of your save folder! If you had a previous version of this installed (above version 1.1.0) then you should be fine, if the version was earlier then there may be some need to cancel an existing Historic Missions contract. However I think that the worst that could happen would be one or two contracts being cancelled. But like I said, I don't want to break any ones saves so I would recommend making a backup!

    As for contract configurator I don't believe any updates could cause savegame issues (unless you are updating from say contract configurator v0.0.1 or something like that :sticktongue:)

  16. Possibly unrelated, when reloading module manager within the game, i see a few "Parent null for ..." messages.

    This ends up being because the files are named "... .cfg" - a space before the .cfg. The two I found were "STS-51-B .cfg" and "Historic Mission Pack .cfg".

    Still looking into why contracts sometimes get cancelled for no reason, and why contracts don't get offered when the should.

    Also, ContractConfigurator has a "no random contracts" agent mentality; the agents in this pack should probably use that.

    Thanks Duna! Ive changed some contract names, maybe this might fix the problem finally! Ive also changed the CNSA logo to a .png from .PNG, it looks like the .PNG had added an extra layer of transparency that KSP didn't like :sticktongue: That being said I have not had a chance to test it yet!

    I will be adding the No random contracts mentality tomorrow hopefully!

    Okay so in this update:

    I have released the RSS version along with the Regular version in the Kerbal Stuff Download link (might separate these out later for ease of use).

    I have also included fixes for most of the bugs mentioned in the last few posts to this thread so thanks Nightingale and Duna for your help!

    Next update:

    Russian overhaul (Foton, Soyuz details and Soyuz-TMA (ISS) missions).

    Enjoy! :)

  17. RSS/RO was released a couple days ago, it's possible to have a prediction for RSS compatibility? These contracts fit like a glove on it :)

    Regards!

    Brilliant! I have not been keeping up to date with the goings on of the forum this last week but this is good news, I'm going to start work on an RSS version now it will just take a little time to adjust all of the values for orbit parameters to their historically similar orbits (time for another round of skimming through 300 Wikipedia pages :confused:).

    So as of now the next update will be an RSS release, with the following update focusing on Russian programs and improvements, maybe even the ISS expeditions.

  18. ''NASA and its Russian counterparts''

    That sentence should be the other way around, RSA and it's american counterparts, we all know where Appollo 11 took place, in sillicon valley :P, seriously tho... ULA still launches stuff using Tsiolkovsky's rocket equations.

    This is a delicious pack but as I know my luck with contract configurator, 391 missions is 391 chances of major bugs :cool:.

    No but honestly it might take some time before anybody notices any bug, if we ever get to them! I'm disappointed you have not included all of ULA launches since the end of the STS program http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/images/smilies/k_tongue2.gif. Just jokes, I feel like part of the fun in your missions pack will be to test them all.

    I was wondering if you had included the tragedy missions such as the Salyut 1 return, the death of Gagarin, Appollo 13, STS 107 (officially 113, NASA and the number 13...), STS 51-L...

    It would be great to succeed those missions in honor of the fallen astronauts.

    I have a musical mind so for the past 5 minutes I have been pondering over "Tchaikovsky's rocket equations" rather than "Tsiolkovsky's rocket equations" :P That's completely true! I hope to one day finally find the time to play through everything that I have made, I will be bug testing every new feature I add in thoroughly from now on but there could be issues every now and then with some of the contracts I first wrote (I began with the STS and Mir missions) so these are the most likely suspects!

    As for the tragedy missions I decided to include them however they play out as the mission would have completed (out of respect to the astronauts), I am actually hoping to include memorial objects (such as a miniature golden shuttle model for STS-51-L and STS-107 or a miniature golden Soyuz capsule for Soyuz-1 and Soyuz-11) to be flown on these missions however my modelling skills are pretty much non existent, but if anyone would like to offer their help just pop me a PM :)

    dunadirect: Wow! Nice find! I hope that everything can get sorted out from that! :)

  19. Hi everyone, exams are over and now I can focus far more time into this pack. First of all I want to say thanks for all of the great comments and support, especially for being featured on Modding Mondays! :)

    dunadirect and Parkaboy, is your Contract Configurator the latest version? if so then could you send me a copy of your output_log files in a message so I can have a look? This is strange but I will look into it. If anyone else has this problem please post below and let me know! As for the V-2 ditching in water... hmm.. I honestly have no idea, the V-2 1944 and V-2 No.20 contracts require the V-2 to be destroyed but the R-1V requires the rocket to be recovered, as long as the V-2 was completely destroyed (no remaining parts bobbing around in the sea (or command parts.. maybe?) then the contract should complete :huh: I will experiment and see what I can come up with!

    As for news on CKAN and KerbalStuff: Should be put up within the next week!

    Enjoy everyone! Next update will be soon, but I will hotfix if I can find a solution for disappearing contracts!

  20. PARAM

    {

    name = ReachState

    id = ReachState

    state = Incomplete

    disableOnStateChange = False

    values = 0,0,0,0,0

    ContractIdentifier = V-2

    title = Reach a suborbital situation

    notes =

    allowStateReset = False

    targetBody = Kerbin

    biome =

    situation = SUB_ORBITAL

    minAltitude = 30000

    maxAltitude = 120000

    minTerrainAltitude = 0

    minSpeed = 150

    Can't get this to complete, once I got the 150 m/s completion when doing way faster, but most of my tries at suborbital result in neither 150 m/s completion or suborbital.

    Unmanned and destroying the V-2 get's completed.

    Sorry about that, I assume you are using the Tantares V-2 rocket replica? I have rebalanced this contract in the latest update so that it is not so difficult and/or annoying to complete.

    A note on the latest update:

    I have included some early unmanned flights such as Sputnik 2 & 3 and some V-2 tests, I have also included a series of missions based on the X-15 (only the flights that broke Mach records rather than the 194 (I think) others... :confused:).

    Exams are easing off now so I will have more time to add more content and improve the pack in general. The next update will focus on another overhaul of the Russian side of the pack, including some more Russian/USSR programs such as Zond, Foton and the enormous Luna series. I hope to also experiment with some tweaks to the MIR and Salyut expedition missions (a prelude to the ISS expeditions) just so that the station is not left unoccupied for gaps between missions.

    I will also begin focusing on separating the pack into modular packs for more freedom of choice for the user!

    Enjoy!

    :)

  21. In a vain attempt to procrastinate from exams I have decided to update and include afew more missions, the shuttle approach and landing tests, the Vega program and some separate space observation missions. I will soon be producing a flow diagram for the contract pack so that everything with its requirements will be clearly set out for anyone wondering when a certain program is accessible, with this latest update:

    - The shuttle ALT missions now need to be complete as well as the Skylab program before the STS missions will become available, the Vega program requires completion of SoyuzT-12, and the JWST, HSO and Kepler contracts require the completion of atleast STS-100.

    With some more consideration I have decided to dedicate some time over the next few weeks to splitting the pack into decade eras as well as the complete release, this will allow anyone to play the missions from a given time period without having to have completed 380 contracts formerly - The JWST would require this currently. Just so that people do not get bored of this pack :D. A separation of each space agency or even individual programs may come later too so anyone who wants to just play the Salyut or Mir program missions would be able to.

    - - - Updated - - -

    I had the same problem. Reading this thread now to see if there was an answer and there is. Great great great pack this! It adds a lot of reason for my space program to exist LOL. I had hope on some more between V-2 and Sputnik :) And also Sputniks 2 and 3 :)

    Anyone know of a part pack with V-2 parts and redstone etc?

    W

    Thanks! :) That is a good idea I will be including some more early unmanned missions in the next update (hopefully), the Tantares pack has a very good set of V-2 parts and is the only one available at the moment I think. The OMSK pack has a very good series of Redstone and Atlas rocket parts which should carry you into the early Gemini missions, beyond that FASA has a great set of parts for the later Gemini and Apollo missions (albeit at the expense of a slightly increased RAM usage). Enjoy!

  22. Awesome. The story missions this game has needed for a long time. Thank u for the work sir

    Not sure if this is a bug or if im missing something but on the freedom 7 mission I use a pilot and do a suborbital flight with an apo of 115k(between 40-120) all like it says and they are all checked off until i coast back into the atmosphere and it says im not suborbital anymore and go home never gets checked off. Not sure wat to do, cant figure out a way be suborbital and go home at the same time.Any help?

    Sorry about that, I had not noticed, I have uploaded an updated version with a fix now! :) Just reinstall and replace any required files and it should work fine, you may have to cancel the Freedom-7 contract and timewarp for a day or two to reaccept the contract, I have temporarily adjusted the payout funds so that you do not loose funds because of this, let me know if this persists or of any other issues! The irony is that I built such a large contract pack but simply do not have the time to properly test everything! :confused:

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