DarkGravity

Not completely broken imho, but ideally there should be diminishing returns for multiple labs processing the same data. I used to run a research lab irl. Multiple labs working on the same problem, each with slightly different approaches is a good thing. The second lab working on one problem might even get a slight boost, reflecting the competition/synergy that happens between labs. 3 or 4 labs working on the same problem should still produce a pretty high return, but after that it should drop off considerably. But if you don't want to invest time into coding all of that, I'd say leaving it as it is, is pretty good. Not many people are going to have 5 labs working on the same data, considering how easy it is to get fresh data.

@MoeslyArmlis, you mentioned you wanted a barn for barnstorming in your original post. These are in the stock game. Just head East from the landing strip. Can't miss em.

$40 seems a bit high to me considering that so many things still need to be polished. If things improve at the pace I'm expecting, $40 might be a reasonable price in a year. But then, that's what sales are for. Speaking of which, when is the Steam Summer Sale?

Well, I've used it a little bit now, and I must say I like it. While it can give you more info than you might want, the default settings only give a small amount of info. You have to manually edit the display if you want a ton of stuff. And no info in-flight unless you have fully upgraded your tracking station, which I haven't. And even then, I think you can opt out. It doesn't feel like cheating or in any way like the game suddenly got too easy. It is a fast download and easy install. I recommend you check it out.

I've never done any of those :-) I have performed as part of a warm-up act for the Duke Ellington Orchestra. I have had anti-matter injected into my brain in the name of science. I have driven a motorcycle 100 mph.

I still haven't used KER except for first glance since I downloaded it. The thing I don't want is for it to make stuff too easy. In the 1960s, achieving a parking orbit with a specific AP, PA, inclination, etc. was not easy. In Star Trek, it is so easy, they just press a couple of buttons and it happens. I don't want to turn the former into the latter. But the base game doesn't give enough info to even play 1960 style. If I want to WORK, I can make the base game WORK 1960s style, but I don't want to work. I want to play. I get the impression that if I choose just a few things to display, I can get what I'm looking for with KER.

Wonderful advice, exactly what I was looking for. Thanks, Captains!

Now that I've got a couple of orbiting stations up including one at Minmus, got some orbiting satellites, rescued a few Kerbals, explored Kerbin's moons, I finally decided to start modding. And I decided to start with KER. Anyone care to share suggestions on how best to use KER? Any tips welcome! Thanx in advance.

Yeah, I've been having some weird issues with clearing experiments. I have a MPL landed on Minmus attached to a ship. 4 scientists in all plus a pilot. The Clear Experiments button doesn't always pop up after I run experiments. Not sure what I'm doing wrong, but I've had to manually go reset them several times now.

I've never done those things, but I have eaten a chipati, eaten raw octopus at restaurant on the beach (amazing how good it is fresh, not rubbery at all), thrown a pie in someone's face.

You want multiple launch pads, VABs an Mission Controls? Would they just be clones of the originals?

I have never done any of those. Cool story though. I have taken a Lotus Esprit for a test drive with an octogenarian in the passenger seat. Getting into a lotus was a very similar experience to putting on a pair of pants. Tight squeeze. I once met Douglas Adams (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy). He claimed to hold the world record for autographing the most towels. I once convinced an adult there is a Trans-Atlantic Highway.

I have had a cat, but the others, no. Three things I have done that the next user hasn't: I have played a song on a piano that required all ten fingers. I have thrown a surprise party for someone. I have hitchhiked a ride from strangers.

No, but early game players do come with certain assumptions and habits from other games, as Cephalo demonstrated. Same thing happened to me. Especially since they are so artificial. Who are we kidding with making the astronaut complex a different biome than the VAB? Simply putting them there is more encouragement than works for me. Cut down the KSP campus biomes by 2/3. Do planes before rockets? I'm OK with that as long as you only need to do really really low tech planes before you can do rockets.

Extra-wide runway sounds good. Being able to customize the campus? I don't see why not. I can't say I fully understand what you are proposing, but over all I like what I hear.

I'm old enough to remember the Apollo missions clearly. It was always very tense. Walter Cronkite saying to America: if they come in too steep, they'll burn up on re-entery, if they come in too shallow, they'll skip off the atmosphere like a rock tossed across the top of a pond, and they'll be lost in deep space forever. It would be nice if KSP captured some of that drama for re-entry beyond the admittedly very cool fire effects. Also, I've never heard of anyone ever in game skipping off the atmosphere like a stone on a pond. Is that even a thing?

You have conclusively proven that it is possible to see the difference if you just bothered to look. However, engineer reports are not exclusively reserved for situations where it is impossible to see the problem for yourself. The difference between having a parachute and not having one can be obvious at a distance too, and you should probably be checking if you have a parachute or not. Yet the game gives an advisory. Why? Cuz it is helpful in some situations to some people. - - - Updated - - - But there IS an engineer advisory to help you prevent that in the first place. And if there is one for that, then there should also be one for this. Either that or they should remove the parachute advisory.

If you line them up next to each other and take an extreme close-up photo, it is possible to tell them apart easily. Heck, you could probably tell identical twin sisters apart using this technique. But that is a highly contrived situation. When someone puts a docking port onto a ship, that is not what they see. Not even close. In these two photos, of course it is possible to tell them apart, especially after playing the game for a long while, but the difference is subtle and some players are new. This can be the cause of needing to redo an entire mission, not just a launch. Maybe it is the kind of thing that would never affect you personally, but considering all the engineer advisories the game gives already, is it really unreasonable to say that an advisory to this might be a good thing? Am I really the only one who could make put the wrong port on and not notice? When you're building a rocket, you don't get the benefit of seeing both of these views at the same time. You only see one on the monitor, the other one is in your memory. And that is assuming you have placed both docking ports before. New players don't have that going for them. The icon for the small one looks like it is large in the parts menu, enticing you to choose the wrong one, and the difference is subtle once installed, at least it can be, depending on the situation. Perhaps even more subtle than the difference between seeing a parachute and not, and yet we have advisories for parachutes and all sorts of other things that are easily seen if you just bothered to look. I'm not suggesting that we revamp the way docking is done in the game. Just an engineer advisory.

Lovely chart. Would make a wonderful mousepad design. Too bad haven't needed mousepads for a while. Either way, thanks for posting.

I appreciate the apology, Capt. Hunt. We're good. I agree, on a small rocket, the difference is easier to see. But those aren't the only rockets. When you put a junior on a 2.5m piece thinking it is a standard port, it is much less obvious, especially to a new player. In that scenario (which is the scenario that happened to me) even the standard port only covers up 25% of the area of the 2.5 m part. Even the standard looks small in that situation, so if you put a junior on, it looks small, but you were expecting the standard one to look small, so it is easy to overlook. But even if it should be obvious to everyone, is that really a reason not to do this? Shouldn't it also be obvious when you don't put a parachute on your ship? All you have to do is open your eyes and look. So should we get rid of parachute reports? Are parachute reports not a welcome part of the game, even though it "should be obvious?" Little advisories like that (not really a warning) can be helpful, especially when failing to notice it can cause you to need to redo a whole mission.

But that's nothing new. There are lots of engineer reports that are given even when the game doesn't know what is right for your ship. Like the game doesn't know if you need a parachute or not. Maybe you're landing on the Mun, so it just tells you "hey, no parachute." Likewise it could say "Hey, your docking port is a Junior." Parachutes and docking ports are both things that get used well after launch, and any problems with them in the VAB can end up wasting a whole bunch of your time, cuz you don't realize there is a problem until later in the mission. When the game informs you that you have no parachute, it is just helping you with what really should be the player's own checklist. It is just kind of a special item because you can need to redo a whole mission and not just a launch. Same exactly with docking port sizes. Just a helpful thing to be included in an automated checklist.

I dunno. I say "I did X" and someone says "you'd have to be blind to do that," I don't see that as simply disagreeing. But that is my final comment on the subject. Maybe I'm wrong. I've been wrong before. Like when I clicked the wrong docking port. Twice. Maybe a better idea would be to make it so that it is harder to click the wrong docking port in the first place. Maybe give them different colors or make the small one actually look small in the parts menu. Or both.

Fine. I still think my suggestion has merit. Am I really the only one who has put the wrong port on his ship?

Unless I'm building rockets blindfolded?!!! And some people say this is the best forum community. Pffft! Why the need to toss in a personal attack, Capt. Hunt? Yes, once you get them out of the menu, (where you acknowledge their appearance is confusing), they do look reasonably different. That is, aside from their shape color and overall appearance. But even if it is easy to tell them apart once they're out into the VAB, who pulls out two at a time to see that difference? Maybe once you have built a bunch of rockets with docking ports, maybe it is obvious, but when you are new, the fact that you wanted the bigger grey circular doodad with the lip on it and clicked on the bigger grey circular doodad with the lip on it is enough to make some idiots without blindfolds think they actually got the bigger grey circular doodad with the lip on it. And since it is a stage 0 item, you can waste a lot of time when you do put the wrong one on. Well, I can anyway. Amazing. I implied I've had it with flames, and still I get flamed. First post. No waiting. I made a mistake. I made a suggestion to help others in my situation not to make the same mistake. I get told no one could possibly have that problem unless they were blind. Lovely. Just lovely.

The engineer reports in the VAB are very helpful. I especially like how they mention non-critical things like if a docking port is being used as a decoupler for a nose cone. Stuff that doesn't have to be pointed out, but if you're being stoopid might be worth looking at before you launch. Well, I can be pretty stoopid at times - especially in KSP it would seem. I just launched my second rocket with the wrong sized docking port. See? I told you I can be stoopid. The problem is they look so similar in certain situations, especially for newer players. Especially considering the icon in the parts list makes the Jr. look bigger than the regular one. So my suggestion is: the engineer reports point out that you are using docking ports of a certain size. That's it: just a little sentence that says: "Clamp-o-Tron Jr. in use." In case you didn't notice what size you put on. Now before the flames start, I'd just like to point out that this is one of those really easy to do suggestions with really no downside (at least that I can see). So why not be helpful to the idiots among us?