CaptRobau

Why? A mod specifically said it wouldn't be a week, so as to not fall into the quagmire that we had with 23.5. If they did get behind, they'd just tell them. They're smart enough to realize that that would be the best way to keep everyone calm.

They're hard to break and have phyicssignificance set to 0, which means they have no mass.

Yes it does seem to be one of the more anticipated releases. I think partially because there is not much bad to focus on. The previous update for example had the media team release videos a relatively long time before release. That rubbed people the wrong way. When the release was then also postponed again, this just got worse. So the hype then just got replaced by a lot of bile. Now people have no bile, just hype.

Since 0.22 stock nose cones improves stability of craft in the atmosphere. Don't have any numbers though.

Not really, as the game will be balanced towards flying rockets that are not reusable. That has always been the majority of KSP and real-life designs. Contracts give you enough money to create your space programs without being forced to make it reusable. SSTOs and other reusable launchers will simply reward the player with extra money for putting in the extra effort to build such advanced spacecraft.

0.23.5 is an update with as much work put into it as any other full update, which is why I called it a full update. That patch added lots of new parts, improved joints, improved maneuver nodes, improved patch conics, asteroids and all sorts of bug fixes and tweaks. It was more content heavy than the 'full' 23.0 release.

D-Magic, would it be possible to introduce a science boost for Kerbal-based experiments (EVA/crew reports, surface sample) based on the crew of the spacecraft? This would make multi-Kerbal crews useful and finally give a reason, other than role playing, to unlock multi-crew pods in career mode. I imagine it'd also be wise to introduce diminishing returns to this boost, so that 100-man ships doing a report on the KSP launch pad aren't OP. In the case of EVA report and surface sample, the boost would be based on the crew of the last spacecraft the experiment performing Kerbal belonged too (if it still exists, so that a crash survivor doesn't get a boost from his dead colleague).

Two things that annoy me when playing the game, which as a result I wouldn't mind seeing fixed for 0.25: 1. Multi-crewed ships are useless. A one-man ship to the Mun is as useful as a three-man ship, even though it's much easier to build. Maybe contracts will offer a few missions that require you to have multiple Kerbals in Duna orbit, but in virtually all other situations a one-man crew is better than anything bigger. 2. Kerbals have no problem with spending a 7 year journey to Eeloo in nothing but a cramped Mk1 Pod. Its cute to think that Kerbals are weird like that, but it also means that stations or deep space spacecraft never ever have to be big. How I would suggest fixing these issues: 1. Give a science multiplier for Kerbal-based science experiments (EVA/crew report and surface sample) based on the crew of the last spacecraft that the collecting Kerbal came from. IRL a 3-man crew would be able to do more science than a 1-man crew. For balance sake it would have diminishing returns, so that 100-man crews won't give you 1000 science for a crew report from the launch pad. 2. A limited life support system that revolves around living space. A 10-man crew to Duna would get you a lot of science, but if they can be transported there in nothing but a Mk2 Landercan and two Hitchhikers (crew capacity of those three is ten) it's far too easy for the science boost you get in return. My life support/living space system would work like this to rectify that: pods automatically produce life support in return for electricity (which immediately solves the issues of manned spacecraft requiring no electricity except for the reaction wheels). But this life support is not enough to infinitely support the maximum crew inside that pod. So you need to add extra pods, solar panels/RTG for electricity and some batteries for the night side of celestial bodies. But once you've got that settled, you can just leave your Kerbals forever in some orbit or landing site. This way you teach people something about life support, but don't make it complex with greenhouses or supply missions.

I imagine it's a very simple thing to add and they might've found it useful for their own testing purposes.

Contracts/budgets are the biggest addition to the career mode since its inception. Unless you hate the idea of career mode it'll completely change how you play KSP and through the procedural contracts the replayability of career mode has been greatly increased. Also it's not the only feature: there's a complete UI overhaul, experimental 64-bit support. It has also been only 4 months since the release of the last update (while the title 0.23.5 might fool people, it was quite the full update) not more than half a year.

The game doesn't punish you for not recovering stuff, it rewards you for recovering stuff. You get money for finishing contracts and from what I've seen that seems ample to run your space program. Most people will not need to recover more than their command pods to finance their career mode.

It should be made part of the asteroid's name. If we ever get more procedural asteroid like thingies such as comets, it could be combined with an abbreviation for its time. An E-Class asteroid from the main belt could be called E-MBA-253 or something.

Aside from the title (make it more descriptive) I agree with this thread. The Interstellar mod has an impactor experiment and its a lot of fun. Makes you feel like you're actually doing an experiment.

It actually makes a lot of sense. The way the rocket is oriented on the launch pad makes sure that pressing right makes the rocket go right, left go left, up go away from the camera and down towards the camera. This helps new players get a sense of how the control setup works.

If you look closely, you see that the RCS powered engines can also work as RCS. If they were inline that nice little feature would be nearly useless.

I'm really impressed by the contracts. They sound like a lot of fun and give objectives that you wouldn't necessarily go for yourself (like trying out certain parts at certain altitudes).

Only one for me: Stock Rebalance Project. Gets rid of a lot of the imbalance naturally found in stock KSP. Every part has its niche now, which really enhanced gameplay for me. And luckily it'll need no wait time, as it just needs Module Manager (and I doubt 0.24 will break that).

I think it'd be more graphically clear what happens. If the entire part just falls off due to atmospheric stresses, people will wonder what happened. If all the solar panels fly off like they do when you enter the atmosphere with them deployed, then it's far more clear that it was because of the atmosphere. It also looks a lot cooler.

This community is great, except for the response to release date changes. A byproduct of our collective enthusiasm for this game. With that in mind I have no problem with Squad being secretive about the release date. Squad should be able to focus on the game, instead of putting out a community ablaze because an unforeseen crash bug resulted in the game missing the release date by a day. That being said, it looks to be very close. The time between media and public release was communicated to be very short, the first media team video has already popped up and the last Steam entry for changes to the experimental branch was 3 days ago.

That's probably best. I tried it out in-game, but the setup of the panels are just not made for it. Non-tracking would be interesting for solar panels, but they have to be tailor-made to really make it work. Perhaps be 3x6 in size. So if you turn them right, they get a lot of power for not that much more weight (no tracking motor remember) but they're not as easy to use as other panels.

At the moment the SP line of solar panels are, aside from aesthetic purposes, useless compared to the OX-4 panels. Because the SP have a heavy cover, making them produce less electrical charge per ton. Yet this heavy cover offers no advantage, even though the description mentions it: This imbalance is rather easy to solve. Make the OX-4 line non-retractable and keep the SP line retractable. This means that you can only deploy the OX-4 panels once, meaning that atmospheric reentry with them remaining intact becomes impossible. So if you want solar panels that need to survive an atmospheric landing or a deep aerobrake, the SP line becomes a viable choice. In a lot of cases the lighter and cheaper OX-4 panels will be sufficient. But for some specialized missions the heavier and more expensive SP line become a viable choice. The Stock Rebalanced Project mod implemented this and I have to say that it works like a charm. EDIT: The 1x6 and 2x3 could be differentiated by having one of them not be automatically tracking the Sun. The Soyuz for example has these non-tracking panels. The non-tracking panels would be lighter (no motor) to make it a worthwhile choice.

That's done so that on the pad, if you move the ship to the right, it goes to the right. Same for left and the other keys. If its fixed, the key associated with forward will pitch you to the right. The way it's now makes it easier for new people to understand the controls.

It's better to move Eeloo when its gas giant gets introduced.

The science system is very unbalanced. One reason is because only three bodies have biome-specific science. This makes things like the Science Lab far too useless when taken to Duna for example, as it has no biomes (which is like the only place where the lab is useful). But as long as there are biomeless bodies, the science system can't be fully balanced (as some destinations will be less worthwhile due to having no biomes). So if biomes are going to be worked on, Squad needs to do it all in one go. It shouldn't be the hardest thing ever, since a modder made a pretty slapdash mod that added biomes everywhere. With more than a week and a larger staff, Squad could do it much better and much faster. Yes, but is this because the modders have to do a workaround or because planets of themselves are really memory intensive. If the latter is the case, Squad can at the very least couple engine improvements (not counting 64-bit, as the game still has to function on 32-bit) to offset the memory increase. Because I haven't noticed any performance chances as planets were added in earlier updates. Multiplayer is the big one that's been confirmed and that's still fully unreleased (a lot of other stuff is just rumors or off-handed comments).

1. In real-life all major moons and planets were discovered before the Space Age. Ignoring that, it'd add very little at this moment to hide the already known celestial bodies that have been plastered all over the internet. If a feature like this introduced, it'd be far more interesting and realistic to have it be used for minor moons around Jool and subsequent planets beyond Jool as well as for the procedural asteroid moons beyond Kerbin's orbit. Make it a real hunt for new moons, asteroid types, etc. instead of a boring rediscovery. 2. As far as I know KSP's engine is not at all setup for this. These asteroids are also not that big. All except the biggest would burn up in the atmosphere and what remained of the largest would make 1 meter crater. 3. Would be cool, although this is already done to perfection in the BetterAtmospheres mod making it a bit redundant in my eyes and more something that should be done when all the main features are well and done.