Incarnation of Chaos

This is one of the BIG reasons I'm such a hardass over speculation threads, because i just know in my gut some random blogger from <Insert major game outlet here> will find it freaking 2-3 years after release or reddit will take it and run with it and they'll find that thread. And after thousands of hands have touched the information, multiple re-links have obscured the source material and more it won't even be considered for a moment that it might just be some passing discussion about a feature that isn't even planned/confirmed by the developers by the community. Because that's the level of garbage we're dealing with in terms of how these "Outlets" get their "Stories" or "Inside information"

Oh i know all of that, but it really doesn't change my opinion on it. But they shouldn't have released on the Xbox One and PS4, hell even the Xbox One X and PS4 pro likely would've struggled. They're using severely underclocked mobile CPU going on 8 years old, and CP2077 is a game that requires CPU grunt for the world, it's NPCs, their scripts etc. PS5 and Xbox Series X would've been fine though. Yeah they got bad press, but like you mentioned. Even if it comes to the legal avenue, it won't matter. They made their money, the game is pumped by reviews (Both rigged and legit), and all of this will be water under the bridge for the majority of customers in months. Just in time for another DLC, expansion or w/e. This isn't me approving of how they handled it, just more saying this is what I've come to expect from the games industry and consumers now. I do think the fact they went and told reviewers they could only use canned footage is pretty scummy, completely destroys whatever reputation they had before. They've basically joined the ranks of Activision and EA in my mind by manipulating reviews like that.

What i find funny is apparently everyone forgot how buggy TW3 was on release, even now it still has issues. Oh and that released on the current gen with some pretty sketch bugs and performance also, but they eventually got it to the point where it's considered one of the better modern games. Any piece of software like a game is not going to see a public release without something interesting cropping up. Should there be more effort to reduce these bugs? Probably, but the longer a game isn't shipping is the longer you're losing money. And despite the bugs it's still going to receive critical acclaim and reviews, along with being the new benchmark for PC enthusiasts all over. CDPR made a calculated business decision to release when they did, and it looks like it paid off handsomely for them. KSP2 i expect will be a mess on release, and unless every review i see points otherwise I'm not even going to consider buying it for several months after at least. That's if the base game proves to be what was promised in the first place as well. But then why delay? If you can't ever release something perfect, why not just throw it out there? Because there's a serious diminishing return on the amount of stability and bugs you can quash after release for certain things, and there's also diminishing returns on how much stability and bugs you'll gain by further delays as well. So you have to look at the project in question, figure out where on this roller coaster of an approximation function you are and decide when to pull the trigger. KSP2 and CP2077 might not even be similar enough for a comparison to be made in the first place, in KSP2 there's multiple systems that comprise the core game play that if they aren't done right the first time, they'll never work the intended way from release on. So while they might not nail the release, if those core systems aren't in shambles I'd say KSP2 will shape up to be something nice in the end.

I mean hypothetically, like K^2 basically said earlier. You could just make "KSP2" and then release an "Update" to KSP1 that deletes it and adds the new game. Then you could opt in to the KSP1 branch via betas on steam or DL directly, but hypothetically you could also just build most of these rockets given unlimited time and funds IRL and wouldn't you rather blow excrements up IRL than on a monitor? It's not really about the ability to do it, yes KSP1 is not the best made game, yes you probably couldn't get very far with KSP1's code compared to starting fresh. But at the end of the day, programmers have to be paid, their machines they work on bought, the power that runs them and the lights kept running, the lease on the building it's all in kept current, and that's been going on for years. That's years they could've been working on other projects, a massive risk and one they might very well have gotten themselves bought out for not delivering the first time. 60 USD isn't too high of a price when you take it all into consideration. So if we only look at "What could be", we fly right over the other massive point which basically comes down to In life, or Physics. There is no free lunch, you will pay someone something at some point to do whatever it is you're wanting.

I mean i wouldn't mind them in KSP2, but... We're going to have torch ships, Orion and potentially Von Neumann machines. Solar Sails just seem kinda out of place in that context, they would be fantastic for deceleration and as massive Wipple shields to protect against the interstellar medium. But in stock? I can already see most people just seeing them as much, much worse Ion Drives. I guess i'm mostly just saying i think introducing solar sales alone wouldn't be the best way to do it, they'd be better coming with additional mechanics making them useful for things besides propulsion (The Japanese probe used LCD patches as a supplement for it's reaction wheels and RCS, now that's something I'd love). Like a partially configurable sail, where you could decide on a number of "Bands" and what materials they'd have. That way you could use them as gigantic standalone solar panels if you wanted, with the according weight penalty. Then again, I'm just expecting something like that the come via mods in the end.

Probably nothing; the Black Death wiped out 30%-60% of Europe's population in 3 Successive waves. This massive decrease in population was the source of the "Recovery", COVID-19 while serious wouldn't achieve such massive death tolls even if allowed to burn throughout the entire population without any precautions. That's assuming it didn't mutate into some more lethal strain, which isn't an assumption I'd feel confident making. More interesting is the knock-on effects on Travel, Business and many other things that people have realized can be done cheaper and easier remotely. I can't predict the future, but if there's a shift towards more of the mundane things being done remotely (Business meetings, Staffing, even more people working remote permanently) you might see a corresponding decrease in emissions. But it's unlikely to come close to the Black Death. And honestly, we have all the tools we need to recover. We shouldn't be counting on a Plague to force us to....

Yeah that's fine; i just wanted to know if it was "Market supply" or "What's in the ground" It seems to be the latter.

Is that figure how much supply exists in theory? Or the sum of all surveyed deposits? Uranium Supply I'd expect to be higher due to it having commercial applications, but Thorium currently has few if any practical uses. I agree it's all limited resources, but the idea that there's less Thorium than Uranium legitimately doesn't make sense. Not only is it 2 atomic numbers lower, but it's a daughter product of several radioactive decay chains. So it should be even more common due to it being replenished. Also those figures are based on traditional LWR reactors that are known to be incredibly inefficient (Not the amount of U and Th, but how long they can "Burn" in a reactor), so using more efficient reactors (Like the Fast Neutron breeders you mentioned above, or Liquid Sodium reactors) would drastically extend these timelines while reducing the amount of material needed. And we're only using Fission to bridge the gap between current Renewables and Fusion power, once we have Fusion we could make Fissionable material from Lead if we had to due to the incredible amount of Neutron radiation available. So basically; i think we're honestly agreed on most of this. You even addressed most of it yourself xD

Personally i think we should be focusing far more on breeding Uranium from Thorium, instead of mining the stuff directly. Liquid Sodium reactors are some of the most underappreciated designs in our history, and much more suitable for use in spacecraft or remote colonies than conventional designs.

You do want the heat, but in the right places. If your pistons begin expanding because of excess heat, and then your timing is off by a few miliseconds...well then no fusion. That's the advantage with Tokamak and Laser-initiated designs vs "Brute-forcing" it. Also the energy comes from the mass, or rather the energy released by fusing the elements in the first place. If the fusion reactions at the center of the sun didn't release more energy than they consumed, then they wouldn't counter the gravitational force attempting to crush the star inward. So no; it's not impossible by far. It's all very, very mathematically possible. Hell Hydrogen Bombs are only possible due to the fact that you can create a massive fusion event in a secondary by using the energy from a fission primary to initiate fusion in a sphere of fusion fuel (Normally Lithium, which undergoes fission into H-3 which then can undergo fusion into He-4 and releases massive amounts of neutrons, which also initiate fission in the remaining Uranium/Plutonium). If you want to know a bit more; look into the "Binding Energy" and specifically the curve of binding energies. Basically, until you reach Iron, you release more energy from fusion than you consume by getting the needed temps. The issue with terrestrial fusion is that we want to increase the rate of fusion, and that means much, much higher temps. So the floor is higher, and the challenges greater.

Fission fuel, or use the energy to create hydrocarbons. When you have cheap reliable energy and a surplus even extremely lossy pathways are plenty viable. Also I'm going to be honest, I seriously doubt the Canadian reactor will work. At least when scaled up, all of those moving parts along with the challenges of containment and removing heat will become liabilities. As for new materials, mostly thinking of heavy elements. There's quite a bit more we can explore on the periodic table, but it's limited by available targets and energy. So more energy means we can make heavier elements for targets, and so on. Perhaps even find the illusive island of stability (or lay it's hypothesized existence to rest). But, I'm agreed that having more people working on fusion isn't a bad thing. More data from different designs could easily inform the construction of more conventional reactors (like the tokamak) and help them solve the remaining engineering problems.

We didn't use the first rockets to go to space, Chinese intially used them as fireworks Fusion, controlled, and producing more energy than it consumes is legit a game-changer; once you have it you now can take all that nasty radioactive waste from your Fission Plants and blast it with neutrons until it decays into nothing (Just....don't be anywhere near this, the radiation would be incredible). You also can now breed all the Uranium, Plutonium and Fissionables you want; yes they can absolutely be used for bombs. But they can also go into RTGs, NTR's and everything else you need them for. You also now have access to energies absolutely inconceivable before, so our colliders, lasers and other energy-limited experiments can push harder. Basically Fusion makes your Fission "Cleaner", and allows you to create as much fuel as you want (Or even any other material.....as long as the decay chains are there). It allows you to use materials in ways that were previously uneconomical, and run your experiments to find new ones. No; we probably won't see a direct fusion drive for decades, if not a century at least after we get the first truly viable Fusion reactor. But we don't need the torchships for now, we'll be plenty busy with our new "Fireworks".

Thank you; the way these people are talking you'd think there was an actual product that was available for purchase at some point. The only people out any money if the game fails is 2K and Intercept, not anyone here. And I'm sure that people will find a way to manage until 2022, there's several great games coming out between now and then along with KSP still receiving updates. Even if KSP2 is a flaming dumpster fire, in a couple months people will move on to other games....

I'm not running RO, so i shouldn't need to worry. Thanks for the assist.

So as of right now it would double patch any OPT tanks if SMURFF is installed? Trying to track down a error with my new install ATM.

You've been asking about KSP's texture formats, how it handles planets, and etc for a while (for at least a week from my lurking). As the saying goes ~Just do it~ Even if you fail; you'll learn quite a bit in the process.

Does SMURFF patch this? Or is your custom solution just for the people who don't have it installed?

I was able to get some scaling by forcing CFX and tweaking the profile, but only with Astronomers visual enhancements installed. You need a GPU load before any additional GPU will get you anything, and KSP just doesn't have it stock. Also as for the idea of using a Nividia GPU as a physx accelerator, unity is using the physx library for physics but it's not running on the GPU. It's on the CPU, and heavily single-threaded at that. So basically unless your computer is a "project car" already and you don't mind messing around with driver settings and profiles to brute-force modded graphics to acceptable levels of performance then there's no reason.

If it was just the pods heatshield exploding, then you're absolutely correct. But very, very rarely do i only reenter with a heat shield only (I normally try to keep whatever is left attached until at least ~50,000km), so the heatshield explosion often destroys the mission by causing the rest of the stack to collide with it. Also I rarely try to get the best reentry profiles, mostly because i dislike waiting for the craft to swing back to the right position, burn and then come around again. So most of it I'll fully admit is a product of my own impatience xD The KV's just seemed to hit a sweet spot for mass, aerodynamic area and nodes that made them more vulnerable to this than a MK1 or MK3 pod. The surface-mounted ablator does make them extremely durable just by themselves, and capable of surviving things that would absolutely destroy a MK1, MK2 or MK3 pod. Which is actually why at first i began using them, since heating of the surrounding surface attached parts on more intense reentries would pop other pods. I'll see if i can actually replicate my edgecase in stock now, because the one variable i haven't considered is that i use FAR which would reduce the drag. So it's far less capable of bleeding off speed in FAR than Stock aero, and more speed is more heat.

What difference does it really make at this point though? Seriously, that's the one thing i don't understand. If our options are either KSP2 is vaporware, or KSP2 will release as a flaming pile of garbage filled with bugs 2 years from now then what does saying any of this accomplish? No money has changed hands, no game has even been available to play, literally nothing but a vague expectation has been set. If KSP2 never comes out, then no amount of posts or developer hounding would make it any less doomed. If KSP2 is in development for 2 more years, and still has multiple showstopper bugs then thankfully the internet exists and reviews will easily convince me my money is best spent elsewhere. Development is not a nice, linear process, even in the largest of AAA studios, and if you go find a good postmortem of any of your favorite games i can almost assure you that there's a point in their development cycle that looked just as if not more bleak. A nice steady path from point A to B in game development is the exception, not the rule I'm afraid it seems.

True, all true.

Another point is how much of KSP1 would honestly be applicable to the development of KSP2, them being familiar with unity would be a plus. But all of KSP1's API's are gone, and the Unity version is more recent. So unless Intercept already had a decent amount of API code written, or the individuals were already familiar with using C#/C++ then it's really not something you couldn't find somewhere else. Modeling? DX11 changes what texture layers are required, and their individual complexity in some places. Now there are mods that use these type of textures and models in KSP, so i guess you might headhunt the 5 people who develop for them (I'm exaggerating for effect, but still). So at the end of the day, the total cost of training you'd save is basically none. Potentially it might actually cost more to train someone who's had the bulk of their experience modding KSP1 than just a normal Software Developer straight out of College, due to KSP1 modder hires potentially having to unlearn so much while also dealing with significant gaps in their own understanding. I can think of a few people here, who might be exceptional enough to meet that bar and not require more training (Myself not included in that set, I'd fall flat on my A$$ day 1. The set would include GamesLinx for instance though). But anyone like this probably had already gotten offers and an NDA had prohibited them from talking, or they already have a job in the field or similar. There's a lot of exceptionally talented people here in general, but talent in one area rarely translates to very broad areas (Like ya know, building an entire game from the ground up). Ps. I only gave one example, it's not to be taken as literally the entire set of people. I just didn't want to write an excel sheet xD

Yeah i said that in a previous post in this thread, bit abridged though.

You could use active supports, which would require actual power to maintain the rigidity of the structure. But they're plenty possible, and if we're already building the death star then i doubt power would be too much of an issue. Though it would also require constantly lobbing mass through a loop with significant amounts of kinetic energy, so if it's expected to see combat i seriously doubt that's the best idea. Not only would the destruction of such a construct be dangerous to anything nearby, but unless backups were installed and always powered.. Destruction of a single one would send the entire structure crumpling inward.

i do hope they're documenting the development process, because I'd love to see a breakdown of just exactly how wrong it all went. Because while i initially even thought the first timeline was achievable; it seems either that the initial prototypes hit a major technical snag that required a complete rebuild. Or the move threw them into development hell, with so many unresolved issues having to be tracked down and indexed before they could even begin working on it due to the people who knew about them leaving. Feature/Scope creep might have also played a major factor, and compounded on top of whatever issues they had. Either way; I'm sure there's a heck of a story somewhere.