PDCWolf

I got the game after they removed the lakes, palms and roads (.13 being my first version) and although the shapes and such didn't make any sense except for the launch tower, it definitely didn't look like someone's first game. In fact, if you look at the first picture, you'll see that only the lakes and roads seem out of place, and while the rest of the models are not the best, they show consistence to a point. One of the first things that broke consistency and wasn't fixed until some months ago was the spaceplane parts, and that's really frightening because they have been in the game since 0.15 and they were already inconsistent, so one can only think that the same will happen with these buildings. I'll also add that the admin building added not long ago already sticks like a sore thumb, and it doesn't follow the existent style to certain extents like not keeping the hexagon (triangle?) based grid for building layout, inconsistencies in the roads, textures being used in ways they are not supposed to, etc.

The models themselves are ok. Can't really check them polygon by polygon though but the shapes are mostly correct, the problem is the textures: They have absolutely no idea about or refuse to follow the art style that's already in the game, you just have to look at the huge difference between the level 2 VAB and the level 3 VAB, it goes 180º palette-wise, and don't even get me started on those decal-looking metal-bolted-together-patch-things with huge bolts on them, whether fitting the theme or not (protip: they don't) they are horrible to look at. And that's just the VAB. TL;DR: KSP didn't use to look like someone's first unity game, now it does, even if this is a huge improvement compared to the barn.

Not really, since most things are presented upfront (like the game being tycoon type with semi realistic orbital mechanics, which is written pretty much everywhere), but for this now you need to have in mind that it is a tycoon game in which you are no longer god influencing everything directly or indirectly (like in any tycoon game) but rather someone giving commands to little green men in a capsule (which doesn't fit with probes either, as I pointed out previously). Not only that, but this idea also forces a lot of lore on a game where nothing is cannon and everything is debatable because kerbals have no backstory at all other than being a very intelligent race with a disregard for security measures. I reference-quote myself on the multiple times I explained this and how tycoon games actually work. What you are mentioning would fit an RPG. To explain those "variations in piloting skills" you post on every single post, you would probably need to tell something like this to most of the players: "It doesn't matter how good or bad a pilot you are, we are simulating piloting on a secondary logical layer of the game and applying penalties or buffs to parts according to said simulation, which is an abstraction of the idea that it is Kerbals piloting the ship and said piloting being manipulated by their skills, and your keypresses sending orders to the Kerbals instead of having a direct effect." As of now, we have the freedom of roleplay what we want, either being god, sending orders to the kerbals, or being mission control and even the kerbals themselves. With this abstraction of piloting skill you kill every single mindset except the second one and you also create a BIG difference between what's perceived by the player and what is actually happening, imagine someone going "I executed that maneuver perfectly, why did it cost more dV? oh wait, I forgot my Kerbal is a rookie" First, you are implying that Kerbals controlling the ship is indeed roleplay and not the actual case at hand, you just invalidated most of your previous posts. Second, not only do you ignore suggestions both by constantly saying that there are none and now also by saying people called them illogical or violations of physics (please, quote some of those posts), but also say most people are putting a gun on squad's head by saying they'll quit playing the game (again, I request some of those posts too). Wow, it's like we are looking at very different threads. Little to no features have been disliked by the community, biggest uproars actually came from things like mentioning DLCs on the official stream and cancelling resources but none that I can remember from a feature, unless you included "features that were included into the game being when being less than half finished" into that list.

See how mindsets collide? To cope with those 2 cases you need: 1- Someone with the exact same mindset as you roleplaying as giving orders to the kerbals 2- Someone with a mindset not focused on efficiency and general vehicle design or to build crafts exclusively for sharing Most of the time, requiring the player to confront a feature with a certain, very specific mindset, is bad because whoever thinks differently, even if its a small difference, will feel the feature is badly thought out, illogical, badly implemented or worse. Well, I would put a 3% boost on anything pointless because it is so small you either exploit to get a real benefit or don't include it at all, as it has been said before on this same thread. No one is against the feature that's why there's so many suggestions and not so many "i don't want it" contrary to what you previously pointed, most seem to -prefer- a feature that doesn't alter anything related to piloting or craft performance, for different reasons, and no, I BELIEVE it isn't squad "just blindly listening and following the community" but rather realizing a mistake pointed out and brought to light by the community before it was too late.

Tell me how rocket performance being affected by kerbals on board isn't unpredictable behaviour of parts, is it because I choose who goes in the pod? Sure, it is predictable on my side, but not when I post my craft on the sharing subforum, I have to specify you need 2 3% ISP boosting kerbals and the pilot needs the overthrottle perk or the rocket won't fully work. See how complex the explanation for that is? do you imagine yourself explaining that to a friend when you tell him you play KSP? It's too abstract, limited on playability (you need a certain mindset to understand it), and changes part performance on a kerbal-to-kerbal basis, which is inherently bad because rocket science doesn't work like that at all. Solutions have been suggested, you even speedquoted (your explanations were off, even when quoting someone) some of them on a previous post. Making compromises elsewhere? Currency gains have been suggested and explained with logically sound arguments multiple times, more complex ideas also received logically sound arguments and explanations too, it seems you don't want to see the forest behind the tree. Now you are assuming squad had the same thought train as you did. So, it took you 16 pages (I use 40something messages per page, sorry for differences) to think about a solution suggested at least 3 times with different explanations, good.

YouTubers and streamers are a way of crowd (public?) entertainment, and -I believe- should not be taken into account when factoring new features, otherwise we would end with shallow cinematic games designed to be watched and not played, oh wait, we already have those and they suck. Not logical -at all-. Tell me how do you change the combustion chamber size, the plumbing, the turbo-pump capacity, etc in flight and then we may talk about it. If those physical changes were to exist (they do, actually, SSMEs were fined tuned multiple times for example to thrust more) why would they require a magical Kerbal instead of a technological advancement (like what most people wanted the tech tree to be about)? Everything else you mentioned here has been complained about multiple times, statements have been made about all of that: Atmosphere is getting overhauled, for example, and until now that's as certain as it can possibly be), the planetary body size problem will arise again and again, and even stronger once they change the aerodynamics. The OP ion engine has been discussed to hell and back, and the final word from squad was "it's more fun to have them be OP", yet the topic is mentioned really often. Also, as far as I remember, the planets and universe in general are small because back in the day there was no timewarp, and you don't want to go to the moon 400000km away without timewarp, it was implemented as a gameplay "enhancement" and stands that way even now that we have our timewarp for no apparent reason (maybe because of the soupy atmosphere, who knows). By the way, it doesn't matter how they get it, they are still affecting ship performance magically with no logical explanation other than abstractions of abstractions of abstractions of somebody's idea of what a good gameplay element should be. Kerbal individualization and motivation to take care of them has been requested (and mentioned by devs) since long ago, most people want the feature, just not implemented like this. I bet most people would be happy if it was introduced as ribbons, medals, plaques, memorials and whatnot, but since they mentioned a gameplay affecting element, that comes into play in the discussion too.

I agree with this, if the toilet had eyes and a mouth he would definitely know and tell you that when you sit on it, you are going to do your second, he knows about it beforehand both from experience and from your corporal language. "wait and see" is ignoring experience and communication attempts (Mu already said what they had in mind in a not so loose way) Rockets keep following laws of physics and responding to my keypresses as they should, and the feature now has the potential of presenting something new and innovative like letting you keep astronauts around as celebrities, give you more information in hud, better E/IVAs, more options for the now-useless orbital science, and a lot of things never tried before instead of a generic and almost insignificant 3% boost to thrust/isp/tank capacity. May I suggest you leave piloting fully controlled by the player? Really, we just came out of a fire pit and jumped into another which turns out to look exactly the same: Craft performance. How is handicapping more or less hollow than 3% boost to performance? Also, I like how you go into everyone's playing mode assuming they do things in a way or another. As of 0.25 Kerbals matter the same they did since first public release, yet I personally take care of them and carefully choose who goes where, how much time do they spent in space and fully apply safety measures to protect them, and they don't get better or worse because of it. Now take that in mind and look at my stance on this. You may have your opinions and whatnot and that can't be discussed, but the conclusions you seem to come and the reasons for them are completely off.

Guys, remember that the more insignificant you make the change just to justify adding the feature as badly thought as it already is, the more useless the feature turns out to be, and will end up taking space in dev time for, as you said, an insignificant change. I live with the constant fear of devs not caring much about what is being talked about in the forums because they give too much importance to that bug tracker, which most people don't know about. I myself visited it a few times, but I don't want to use it, feels awkward and overwhelming.

Then you need to get some lenses because in most of those "this sucks" posts there are indeed suggestions.

Well, it is me indeed pressing the keys, whatever way you like to think about it, if I don't touch the keyboard, nothing happens. Whether you believe the ship moving is a consequence of Kerbals interpreting the keypresses as some god or they themselves acting (which would fall into roleplay) doesn't affect the final argument that if it is me pressing the keys and flying the exact same pattern again and again and again (think of something as simple as being on the pad and pressing z, hitting space and waiting to run out of fuel, there's no way to do that differently) and getting different results is defying the laws of physics and penalizing/rewarding me for something that is definitely not happening which is a change in how the vehicle is piloted. You are missing the mark here, remember this is a tycoon game (for the nth time, jeez). Also, none of those interpretations include probes in them, which, in theory, have preprogrammed paths with options of on-the-fly program modifications like in real life. You can't fit any of those two perspectives on that case. If I accept abstraction B, then probes should be programmed on the ground and sent up with little option of program changing other than rotating, translating and burning with very long delays because, according to perspective B, I'm not the computer, I'm giving orders to mission control. How can you aim a self-aiming solar panel that automatically searches for the sun better? even worse, how can you aim a fixed solar panel better?. The better option for these kind of improvements is to explain it with magic or calling it an abstraction exactly because they have absolutely no relation to logic or physics. Now, I recommend you go back and read all those beautiful solutions to the problem, like boosting science gains (scientist kerbals), reputation/fund gains (celebrity kerbals), and the one I suggested, which is changing the information you get in flight thanks to better pilots who can actually operate those beautiful displays on the new IVAs and show you more stuff, sort of a kerbal-experience-driven K.E.R. flight assistant.

I like how you defend your argument by going to extremes, it seems that for you it is either "the kerbals do it or you do it" and not the normal god mentality you get on every single tycoon game (roller coaster tycoon, zoo tycoon, prison architect, tropico etc). The problem of catering to wider audiences is that, when not paid much attention to, the methods used end up in discussions like these or things like Minecraft. You can indeed cater to wider audiences, but you need to think very well what you do to your game, because it may get a good amount of people that paid for your product mad, and that ends up in bad publicity in the future, you know, balance fast money with long run money.

But it doesn't work like that. IRL, if you throttle down a rocket engine, there's less pressure on the combustion chamber and thus less exhaust particle velocity, meaning overall less ISP. This is not simulated in KSP, but it doesn't mean it is suddenly logical. Now that's the kind of community no one should look forward to have, people that don't mind what you do to your game, it's almost the same as fanboys. I also dislike the "make it an option" because it feels like breaking down the discussion to a point where people go "you take it as it is, good or bad, or you turn it off" instead of trying to actually make things better. There are indeed things that would fare very well as options (difficulty related ones for example like relays, reentry heating or life support once they come to existence) but this is not one of them.

Oh come on, don't copypaste us please, feels degrading. Anyways, take for example a 5% increment of ISP, that's boosting the NERVA to 840 Isp, which is a lot in the long run. Add two Kerbals that can give you 5% boost and you get closer to an overly efficient (OP) LV-909. The problem is that going lower than that may make the feature feel useless too, that's why I suggest thinking what is actually affected by Kerbals instead of taking the easy way out. Some of the stuff mentioned in this thread (and on reddit) is pretty good actually and would make for a more than enjoyable, non-physics-breaking, well thought-out experience.

Rocket equation is fixed, if two kerbals burn full power retrograde at periapsis at ETA-to-PE 0 with 180 units of fuel and they get different results, then you have a violation of physics' laws. And no, there's no way to do that more or less efficiently if you point retrograde and hit Z when the ETA-to-PE is 0, it doesn't matter if you are the most experienced pilot or you are doing the tutorial for the first time. I'm god and I influence the Kerbals directly because I'm the creation and creator itself in this tycoon game. I make things happen or not, I even control the flow of time. That's how tycoon games work. If you want to roleplay differently, do so. That would make sense if I get something like RT's flight computer and click prograde and set a burn time/dV and hit execute, not with the traditional tycoon style of being god. As I say, even if I roleplay the kerbals controlling the ship, it is me, player, who presses the buttons at the end of the day. If I remove the Kerbal then I have no one to influence with my godlike powers, I just have a big piece of metal floating aimlessly in space and there's no logical way to influence that.

Why? it's me making the inputs. Think of it as the god pulling the strings, it's the way it works on every role game, and even more on tycoon type games like KSP, even if the guy in the cockpit is green and has an eye bigger than the other, the controls are mine. There's no reason at all to penalize me (in case of low level kerbals) if I'm a great pilot just because it's my first mission and none of my kerbals have experience. the same applies for the contrary. If there was full blown machjeb style automation, then it would make sense to differentiate kerbals by piloting skills, but it is me behind the controls. If you know how to press buttons, you can do anything on any game, even fighting that high level bandit on the bridge on Morrowind who can one-hit you with his axe. Also, skyrim is a bad example because everything scales and you can do everything at any point in the game. He meant what I'm trying to say since my first post in this thread: Why should a "bad pilot" kerbal affect my efficiency if it's me manually controlling the ship and flying the most efficient pattern/transfer/landing? or rather Why should my ship behave differently on the exact same situation just because my kerbals are high/low level? it is me pressing the keys and I'm the best pilot in the world, I shouldn't be losing/winning efficiency just because I brought Juan Kerman with me. Kerbals who can make a ship more efficient even if it is flown -exactly- the same way every time is a violation of physics.

The problem with that example is that input is manual and given by the player, if it was automatic then it would be totally different, but for now it means that even if I fly the exact same pattern, my ship is going to behave differently. Different pilots used different amounts of fuel because their landings were totally different too, even if it's a book procedure, also landing sites were different from one another and thus having different fuel requirements (go land on the mun at a 9km high mountain and then inside a crater and tell me). The rest is contradictory, either it makes a difference or said change is so small it makes the feature useless from the get go.

He/She swings because I click and he/she hits where I aim and when I say so, they fly because I press the keys and decide (or tell them) how to fly my ships. Really, there's no defense to this one in particular other than being arbitrary about it and going "they make the ship more efficient because I programmed it like that", it has no logical background at all.

The point is, you can pilot a rocket more efficiently by adjusting ascent paths and using better input overall, but you can't change the way a combustion chamber works or the exhaust particle velocity or the fuel consumption rate just for being in a ship. In the case of adjusting flight paths and control inputs, it is me piloting the ships better, not saving fuel because there's a 5th rank Kerbal on board. It's way too arcade. As I said, I wouldn't mind a smarter kerbal with experience knowing better what experiments to perform or how to perform them or knowing to control a flight computer giving me more/better information in hud or navball, or a very experienced pilot making the SAS stronger/better, those would feel balanced (and more appropriate) and would make a better experience overall than making my ship overly efficient just for having 3 pros on board.

No. The only thing that sounds reasonable is science gain (although it is already big, even on hard difficulty). One way to call this, in my opinion, would be "too arcade". It feels like a hasty, "glued on" feature in which no time was spent thinking about it and how it'll affect the game and the overall user experience but rather thought out with the "how cool would it be" mentality.

Thanks for the update, been using this since you posted it. It was my dream to be able to make stuff like this: http://a.pomf.se/vissqo.webm again, thank you.

Well, guess I'll have to play more with moving the CoM and CoP around until things work. Thanks for your time.

Wait a moment there, nothing should work better when closer to the CoM, roll aside and at least longitudinally, yaw and pitch work better the further away they are from the CoM (you know, go to a seesaw and try moving it closer to the center or further away blablabla) or at least that's what I have been taught. Unless I misinterpreted what you said.

Well, I left NEAR alone (and left real chute to load some of my already made designs which include the chutes), the problem still persists. Here's the output log: http://pastebin.com/8BWua9sv I also ran a quick test to make my problem really clear. I'll leave the images as links as to avoid uselessly clogging the thread with huge images. First, I made a "conventional" plane, main wing is forward, right at the COM. I disable pitch on the ailerons and leave it only to the stabilizer. Take off speed is about 200 m/s and I can't pitch any further than the image, the most violent turn I can get is about 2g. Image is about one second after take-off: http://i.imgur.com/iq0whLI.png For the second part, I enabled pitch on the outmost control surfaces on the main wing and the stabilizer, take off speed is greatly reduced and pitch authority is better (still lacking, but allows for actual flying). Again, picture taken about one second after take-off, the difference is greatly noticeable: http://i.imgur.com/nBShV7U.png Anyways, I realized I'm using MM 2.5.1 and NEAR comes bundled with 2.5.0, maybe that's the problem? As per reproduction steps: 1-Make a spaceplane using either a pure delta, compound delta, or any other delta based design without canards (sr-71, Avro Vulcan, HAL Tejas, the space shuttle, etc) OR 1-Make a spaceplane using any conventional (Main wing forward and stabilizers back) design and disable the pitch on the main wing's control surfaces 2-Hit Launch 3-Continue with normal take-off procedures 4-Craft should be lacking in pitch authority 5-Finish flight on any desired way 6-Go back to spaceplane hangar 7-Enable pitch on main wing control surfaces (for conventional designs)/move the delta wing way forward to get control surfaces closer to the CoM (On delta designs) 8-Hit Launch 9-Continue with normal take-off procedures 10- Craft should have better pitch authority now

Hi there!, been using NEAR since... well, can't really remember, but I love it. Quick question: I downloaded 1.2.1 and tried a few designs and it doesn't matter what kind of design it is, I just don't seem to get enough pitch authority. I made an SR-71 look-a-like, a "normal" mk1 based compound delta, an A-4, etc, to no avail, nothing has enough pitch authority unless I place my control surfaces as close to the CoM as possible (or at least that's what I could figure with my tests). I also made a Skylon thingy and if I disable pitch on the main wing, then I have no pitch authority at all. TL;DR (and probably clearer): I have to put my control surfaces close to the CoM or I don't get pitch authority (whether I use deltas, cannards, both, or conventional designs, pitch authority always comes from the control surfaces closer to the CoM)

Since we are all doing this: Aerodynamics Model: I believe fixing the aerodynamics would add that "i saw it in real life so it must work here" thing both with planes and rockets, I remember building my first plane back in 0.15 and it didn't even took off the runway, even when it was supposed to be the easiest thing to fly in the world (long slender body, normal tail arrangement with elevator and rudder, high wing with dihedral). I tried to identify the problem (back then we didn't have much tools, CoL/M/T indicators came in 0.17 IIRC) and everything was in place (you know, moved the gear around to see where the CoM actually was, etc) and it just didn't fly well because of the aerodynamic system. And don't even get me started on the time when I realized nosecones actually made everything worse and coneless pancakes flew better than tall and thin rockets. It is really counter-intuitive, the more knowledge of real world rocketry/aeronautics you have, the worse it is. ISP Fix I was always bothered by how chamber pressure is not simulated at all (if you throttle down the engine, it should be less efficient too), I didn't know that thrust was supposed to change. I installed KIDS some time ago, and the difference isn't really that much, but it is a nice thing to have. Scale All in for it, the minimum should be to keep the 4.5km/s to orbit requirement with whatever the new aerodynamic model is. Anything above that I'd be happy with, but it is unnecessary from a gameplay standpoint Re-entry heat This was promised for 0.19, never came, never got word of it again. Literally everyone knows this should happen, it's in movies, and if you are old enough you remember the Columbia disaster too, so you have it present. Life support Also planned and promised, never heard of again. I'd be happy with something akin to TAC. I don't mind a simplified model as long as it doesn't remove difficulty and comes with pretty parts. There aren't any cons that I can list, really.