Xaiier

I have already expressed my opinion and reasoning for such in my back and forth with RedIronCrown. I would like a system like our current one except where cargo bays properly shield things inside and nosecones actually work. You say stock aerodynamics is terrible. Compared to what? Reality? This is exactly what I am talking about, the basis for your unjustified claims is entirely reliant upon comparing KSP to real life. That a nosecone increases drag is inherent in the mass->drag physics of the Kerbal universe, that may be a dumb design from a gameplay perspective, but there isn't anything inherently wrong with it. As I stated previously, my experiences with KSP have not led me to believe that people have natural intuition about how all this works. Agreed. If you grew up in the Kerbal universe where mass = drag and played a game called Human Space Program in which drag was based on physical shape you could be making the exact same arguments that those mechanics are ridiculous and should be changed. Because I disagree that "easily understood" is inherent in realistic aerodynamics, you are going to have to provide reasoning as to how it would improve the gameplay, and how the drawbacks from doing such would be outweighed by the benefits.

I am of the view that KSP would be best served by a very simple (if perhaps slightly improved over the current one) aerodynamics model, and that each player can then choose if they so desire to upgrade that with mods. I really don't feel super strongly about this either way, however what really gets me going is when people toss "realism" all over the place as if that alone is a valid argument and join aerodynamics elitist clubs to bash stock together, exclaiming in disgust together how stock is such a terrible thing because it isn't realistic. This is why I reacted so harshly to your original post, as it was the same kind of post I've seen hundreds of times over in countless numbers of threads and it never accomplishes anything by being restated. Like I said in my initial post, this needs to be a discussion about gameplay and how that can best be served, not realism for its own sake.

Every argument here is based on comparing KSP to real life and then claiming that KSP is wrong because it isn't real life. This is exactly what I wanted to avoid in this discussion. I must ask, do you do much flying around the KSC, or is it just forward and up into space?

I don't know if you have ever had the experience of showing someone KSP who has never played it before, but no matter what kind of person they are or the experience they have had with other similar things, the first rocket they throw together in KSP is always some hideous monstrosity with engines bolted on randomly at the top and fuel tanks and boosters slapped on everywhere. That is a mentality that continues for quite awhile as they learn what works and what doesn't. It is from my experience with this that I don't think most people really have an inherent understanding of aerodynamics and the way a rocket or plane works. As such, a lot of new players will now be faced with an extra challenge that they have yet to consider and will have to endure more of the frustration of trial and error before realizing what works. Difficulty is applied to everything, it takes every part of the game and makes it harder. Challenge adds a new portion of difficulty at the "end" so to speak, meaning it takes longer before you master everything. Realistic aerodynamics falls under the "difficulty" section because it inherently makes every stage of your experience more difficult. My planets example on the other hand doesn't affect a player until they have progressed to the point where they can begin to consider them, meaning that that learning stage lasts a bit longer. It is like a FPS game where you can turn up the difficulty and all the enemies become better shots and move around more tactically, as opposed to adding another level at the end which includes more enemies which you must fight at the same time. To an experienced player, both are essentially the same, but for a new player, it dramatically increases that basic level of competency required to succeed. Even with structural failures turned off, you can still shred your craft due to the way forces are distributed across parts. This obviously depends on the final implementation from SQUAD though. One thing I found particularly irritating was how more jet engines didn't equate to more speed, due to the way FAR nerfs them. It is going to require a careful balance act to make sure everything continues to play nice together. Another thing to note is FAR's DCA system which decreases maximum deflection based on speed. Its essentially required for a keyboard user as otherwise you will quickly find yourself either torn into pieces or in a terrible spin from overdoing a control input. These are all things that have to be kept in mind when making a new system. As I said above, I don't agree with your reasoning that it makes it easier, because in my experience that isn't what new players do. As you have probably seen, the first few flights of a player trying out FAR are always frustrating, as they now have to deal with not only do they have enough thrust and fuel, but also whether their rocket is aerodynamically stable and a more advanced gravity turn. Throwing a new player into that from the beginning isn't a good idea. ------ There is nothing wrong with a game containing elements which match that of reality. That doesn't make it a simulator any more than any game with gravity makes that a simulator of gravity. I think it is obvious from Harvester's original post that KSP was meant primarily to be a fun game which happens to contain a not-oft used bit of reality (which wasn't even decided at that point). I never said I didn't want improvement. What I want to discourage is how people demand realism because KSP should be a simulator without realizing that at its roots, it has never been about that. It is just a game with mechanics like any other. If I had to describe KSP in a sentence, I would say that it was "A game about building rockets to fly to space and land on other planets." I don't need to use "realistic orbital mechanics" or "simulation" because those aren't important.

Yet another person that would have been saved by Jebretary

Kerbal Foundries

To an extent, it makes sense, but you could apply the same argument to orbital mechanics, and almost nobody has prior knowledge of orbital mechanics. The problem is that referencing realistic aerodynamics significantly limits the creativity of players. You can easily imagine a real world rocket or plane because they basically all look the same in the real world. Changing KSP to a system that works the same way will result in there being only a few effective solutions for any given problem, and thus players will not be able to create those wacky Kerbal designs that somehow fly. This ruins the "more boosters" mantra which has been an integral part of KSP's style for a long time. Also, more challenging isn't necessarily better. KSP is quite difficult already, and adding what basically amounts to "hard mode" isn't a way to expand upon the challenge. Tuning up the difficulty is usually a sign that a games challenges are not complex enough. An example of adding challenge without just boosting the overall difficulty would be adding more planets along the likes of Tylo and Eve, which are very difficult to conquer. Perhaps it is just personal experience, but I've never found KSP flight to be that jarring compared to realistic sims. From my experience with FAR, the only real difference I noticed was that everything is slower and more fragile, which can hardly be called an improvement from the gameplay sense. This is debatable. The joy I get from flying hilarious monstrosities around balances out whatever I'm losing in educational value. Because KSP is meant to be a little bit silly, I enjoy the break from reality sometimes. You've done better than most at arguing your case without falling to that, but I still have to question how you can simultaneously claim that realistic aerodynamics make it both easier and harder at the same time. Notice that you claim that is makes design easier because we can copy the real world, and also that it makes design harder, because we can't just brute force it.

This just in: explosions not a KSP feature? More at 6.

This is where its at. I've had numerous arguments on the IRC channels with various FAR/NEAR supporters as well as ferram himself about the stock aerodynamics, and while I agree that it should be up to each player whether they want realistic aerodynamics or not, the only argument I've ever seen for "realism" is "realism" itself. Often people get so caught up over trying to make KSP into a realistic simulator that they overlook some of the more glaring elements of ridiculousness in the Kerbal universe. Things like: -Kerbals are literally Little Green Men -But seriously... -LITTLE GREEN MEN -The density of every planet is such that no material in existence could possibly work -The Kerbal system is unstable and far too small for its state -No relativistic effects or even proper light simulation -etc -... I've said it many times and I will say it again, KSP is 100% game, 0% simulator. Sorry if that offends you or something, but its the truth. KSP has never been about realism. Need proof? Here's a snippet from Harvester's original post about KSP on the Orbiter forum: That's right, the initial concept of KSP wasn't even set on solid orbital mechanics. As a game, the challenge of KSP is to overcome things to succeed, and it doesn't matter whether the rules set forth for the game universe are realistic or not, what matters is if you can learn how to use them to your advantage. The problem a lot of people have is that they refuse to accept the rules that have been set forth in the game world and cry about a lack of realism when they fail. Its the logical equivalent to playing a shooter game and ignoring the fact that bullets can't curve around corners, and then complaining to the developers that you can't shoot people around corners! Anyways, in conclusion, my point is that if we are going to argue over aerodynamics, lets make that argument be based around why realistic aerodynamics would improve the game experience and expand upon the challenge, and not based around "realism because realism".

I feel like with a fast enough connection, any standard remote access application would be able to work with KSP. You may need some aids for those important moments like landing, but otherwise the game would work at delay levels even far beyond what most streaming services work with.

What does this do that TAC Fuel Balancer doesn't?

Yes, http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/92764

Thanks for the kind words everyone. Nothing makes a modder happier than knowing people enjoy his work. As for 0.90, I have yet to test it but there shouldn't be any issues due to the update, feel free to try it. I'll be working on refactoring and fixing some of the bugs and should have an improved and tested with 0.90 version soon.

This definitely sounds like a good idea from a business perspective, but I have to wonder if market dominance by one company is a wise course of action. With so few games of this genre out there, combining two of them under the Kerbal mantra might be a bit too limiting. Perhaps a better course of action would be a partnership in which KSP and SimpleRockets both give more attention to the other, and perhaps both make some minor changes for them to fit better together.

I'm going to have to agree with the moderators point of view for this one. Often times, single posts are deleted for the sake of many a topic. If a thread is closed, it means that that topic was prone to causing further arguments, requiring constant attention from the moderators to police it and keep it in line. I would rather have a little less freedom in topics than have the moderators be overloaded with a number of topics that they have to keep close watch on and the quality of the entire forum decline as a result.

I was under the impression that the altimeter issue was due to the animation of it only, and not actually reflective of the true altimeter being messed up. Is that what you mean? Yes, thanks for the detailed report! If you look a couple posts back, you can see that this is a reported and known issue. I've got two more days of finals and then I'll be free to work on this again and fix some bugs. Sorry for not being able to do anything sooner!

Technically, yeah probably a bit, but not enough to matter as far as you are concerned.

There is currently a bit of unused code in the TimeWarp class which facilitates automatic warp-to, it's likely something like this is planned. It appeared in the code in 0.24.

Sounds like a neat idea, though I doubt many will support it due to it being somewhat "cheaty" I've got something like this planned in an idea of mine to make a bunch of parts that do various magical physics bending things like hover and cancel gravity, but I don't think I will have time to do such a thing any time soon. If anyone else wants to pursue it, feel free.

You assumed wrong. Almost every mod is compatible with every other mod, the few exclusions being two mods which might do the same thing or change something another mod relies on. What is meant by BTSM is that it is not balanced to work with other mods, and that you can do so at your own risk of making the game very imbalanced. It's just a general warning to let people know so they don't post stuff like "This mod and x mod make it super easy to do y you should fix that"

It sounds like you want the dynamic control authority provided in FAR, the last button on the GUI labelled "DCA" It changes the maximum deflection based on velocity and you can define how much it does so in the settings.

I'm pretty sure Firespitter includes an electric prop. You could also probably rig something up with Infernal Robotics.

What is this, #blackfridaygate?

First off, by "delta time" I presume you mean the max delta time in the settings. And the answer is yes... Yes, my mod Time Control gives you a way to change the max delta time slider from the settings while in game, and also has a somewhat effective "auto" mode which can play with the max delta time as well as the actual time speed to maintain good FPS while maximizing in-game speed. Your rails idea might potentially work, though as you noticed, handling physics properly for such cases becomes problematic. That wasn't a mod, that's just naturally how Unity works: http://docs.unity3d.com/ScriptReference/Time.html It's directly related to the max delta time, a short summary being "if it takes longer than max delta time to perform calculations for the 0.02 long physics step, cut it off and slow everything down to keep FPS up over game speed"

The physics update rate is 50 per second as the timestep is 0.02, the 30 mentioned is incorrect. You may want to see THIS for a better explanation of the physics update system. It is unlikely you will need to bother much with that stuff anyways, unless you are doing something really specific.