AngelLestat

If you dont wanna have restrictions, play in sandbox mode, that mode is made for that. But if you wanna play career mode, then it will be "logic" to have things and restriction like you would have in a real space program. After all that is the tittle of the game. Not just becouse you may have a limit in budget is mean that you can not make some big mission. How I explain this.. mmm I dont know how it will be, but lets imagine that we have X amount of cash. Some ways get founds can be: -put some private satellites in orbit. -space turism -minering -make a space solar collector and sell energy to kerbin. -obtain a bonus by certain amount of science points. -by making some achievements. -get a loan that you can paid in installments (turns based). -etc. All this adds gameplay. But if you are only limited by your tech tree. Then once you have vertical and horizontal decouplers, docking port and duct pipes you can go anywhere. Really? what can stop you there? Of course a good monetary system needs to be very well planed to prevent bored loops in missions. And the way you make money it will be your choice. So people will choice launch some satellites or others just do explorations. After all, when nasa or other agency arrives to a new planet, it gets public attentions, that can be traslated to money incoming. Also new planet pictures can be imprented in books or used for documentary.

+1 All that plus: i would not want to see a future KSP game without procedural parts, becouse this mean that the part bottle neck (ogly rockets) and game performance issue it will continue.

Ok, maybe we use different words right there, but is just the same that I want.

I would not like to see any fantasy addom who does not follow real physsics.

If you speak of my imagination like the way to think, simul and solve things, then your are right.. It works in my imagination, but I can understand if does not work in yours. Try to critic using facts and logic next time. On the other hand you made a very good point explaning why it will be pointless in mostly all cases implement lagrange point using this system.

Eric S and boomerdog2000. The fixed orbit works in time warp mode only.. And when you are out of time warp you use n-body physsics that only had into account the craft, not the planets. Doing this you can have stable lagrange points where you can place your sattelites or crafts. This is the only way, becouse we dont have computers to mantain a perfect orbit like our real satellites do. And we can not make so much calculation in timewarp mode if we had more than 20 crafts in different orbits. So yes.. they need to be fixed orbits. And we keep the realism of the game. it does not matter how we accomplish that.

two main questions that nobody is asking is: what we want? and... how can we get it? We want lagrange points... so.. the other things does not matter. We need real simulation of orbits between planets? NO. Any solar system who has life is enought stable to avoid any planet collision in a range of 4000 millons years. So fixed elliptic orbits is fine (or how you called on-rails). But if if want lagrange points we need to calculate n-body physsics for all planets? NO. Only for the craft having into account the 2 gravitational body positions. That is it! besides, all lagrange points are fixed points between 2 objects. So why not make zones in game that in case your craft is in the desired point with the desired vector speed, then you enter in a stable fixed orbit in the lagrange point. And no calculations are needed. this is how you delimit and solve programming problems.

I also thing that something like n-body physsics can be possible to implement, how? is a different question. So if someone knows a way to implement this (at least with 3 bodys so we can have lagrange points) consuming the same process time it will be welcome. But it does not help said that it can be done and ask to devs to solve it. If you have an idea how to do it... post it.. With formules and full detail. Of course I dont see the point to simul real planets orbits with n-body physsics. The planets can still have their fixed elliptic orbit. So this will influence only crafts. PD EDIT: I was thinking, how KSP deals with craft orbits in timewarp mode. If they calculate movement and gravity in timewarp mode (when you have an elliptic orbit) is a waste of process time. If you have an elliptic orbit you can take that elliptic shape and move the craft using those elliptic parameters until you have an encounter with another body. So there is no need to calculate the gravity effect all the time. In case this is not the current way to do it, I really suggest to do it. This will help a lot when we have many crafts orbiting.

Stock?? quantity discount? Please.. this is a Space Program! You do not buy stuff in the same way you buy in a greengrocery. Everything that is made for space, is made for space. 90% to 95% of the components are all designed for the purpose. Almost the 100% of the main components are not standard. So you will not find a private factory where rockets components are made and open to public sale. Agencies made themself or sent to build all the stuff that they need (with a cost of course), But words like stock or discount does not have much sense in this area.

Ok, lets said that "we can" launch most of the rockets without a big problem in performance. But that is becouse ksp has no graphic quality or extra terrain models! Try to install universe remplacer with a 8x texture for kerbin, then launch the same rocket and tell me what happen... What about someone who has an old computer? If we can get a performance boost, lower the loading time and increase the part count all at the same time, the question is.. "Why not do it???" Really, I dont understand why someone can be against this. Is like be against multi core support... But that is our choice! Is the liberty that the game gives us. Some people likes to make big things. This post yours just dodge all the things that me JohnFX already answer you in our previus post and you ignore. What about the space station example that I show you just below mine, that you can reduce the part count in a 1000%. You are forgeting that you reduce your game loading time, you had more free memory at disposal and even if you can not cut many parts with some design, some parts you will cut anyway. This traslate into better CPU and GPU performance. And your crafts looks nicely at the same time. How is that? I give you an example so you can explain step by step why it would be different and you didn´t. I will copy paste again: if you had a craft with 4 small tanks (pair stack), 1 middle tank and 2 big tanks stack. (3 cfg files, 3 models and 3 textures) 7 parts Now lets said that you can make the same craft using procedural (1 part menu) with only: 2 small tanks, 1 middle and 1 big. (1 cfg file, 1 model, 1 texture) 4 parts. Why instance would help in one case and no in the other? Reduce to half the part count in a common big rocket is something minor to you? Can you post the source? Physics merging? what does it mean? That if you have a fuel tank over an rocket engine would have the same physics than other tank in any other place of the craft? Until now is the idea that can be done and the one that brings more benefic to performance you like it or not. If you are against try to prove it with LOGIC. No ignoring all the comments that you can not answer. We can talk all day about other methods to improve performance.. the final question is: Squad can do it? we can do it? If the answer is not.. Why spend more time in that?

Those specific ships are the ones that need more optimization. A rocket with 20 parts does not need optimization, but one craft with 500 parts it does.. Even if some kinds of design does not get much optimization, your loading time would decrease. And I am against that. Is not the thing that I am suggesting, so lets remove it from the discussion. I dont follow you here. Why it would not help? You can have 5 or 10 different crafts close enoght in orbit, all these craft would have common parts. Tanks for example, you can have rcs tanks, liquid fuel tanks, LFOX tanks and with different sizes. All that with just 1 or 3 procedural part. These one would be cilindrical, half egg shape and spheric (rcs model). The half egg shape can remplace also each nose cone in the game, remember that you can choice fill it with fuel or not. And I am not against other ways to improve the game performance. If SQUAD in the future can exploit the differents hardware architectures it will be welcome. But I guess Procedural is the only thing that SQUAD can do right now to improve the performance and gameplay. Well you got me there. I guess that kind of craft can only be reduced by 10 or 15 parts. But that is becouse is full of mod pods. But a curious fact, I made that in the .18 version, 1 weak after I finish, the .19 version come and almost ALL mod parts that I used stopped working. This happens almost with each KSP update. I guess that answer you the question of why not just play with mods. Now focus in the space station that is posted below mine here. If we count only the panels it has 150 parts. 120 of them are flat and can be remplaced by 12 parts. The rest can be remplaced by 10 more in the case that the procedural part has these size limits. Fairing mod is amazing, and it can be reduced even more, from the 10 parts that it use, it can be reduced to 3. One extra advantage is that extra tank sizes like 3,75 or 5 gives you the chance to launch heavy payloads with less parts and better looking. If some day Squad makes a system to model drag, this will be essential. No one asked himself why SQUAD did not fix the drag model yet? For that reason.. they need extra sizes and parts. But they know that right now each part that they add to the game it harms by a lot the performance.

...really?? OK, so for instancing you are meaning that. Perfect, but is your next paragraph the one that seems illogical. I dont understand you, maybe we have different meanings of procedural parts or we are talking of different things. English is not my first language and I guess is not yours either. If you know spanish, PM me and this will be a lot easier to understand. Why is different? You are not generating the texture... the cfg parameters that you set dynamically is the same that you send with a normal part. Even more, the engine has NO IDEA that is a procedural part. For example, if you had a craft with 4 small tanks (pair stack), 1 middle tank and 2 big tanks stack. (3 cfg files, 3 models and 3 textures) 7 parts Now lets said that you can make the same craft using procedural (1 part menu) with only: 2 small tanks, 1 middle and 1 big. (1 cfg file, 1 model, 1 texture) 4 parts. Using that example, tell me how is different from the engine perspective.

oh sorry, maybe you dint read the 10 times that I mention "SNAPING BETWEEN STANDARD SIZES"

You know very well that the problem comes with hundreds of parts all with its physsics. Also the memory usage for each part texture. How much you optimize the game it would depends if you compare against vanilla or with mods. My estimations against vanilla it would be: -25% less loading time and memory usage. (this also means scene transitions times, etc.) -from 10% to 300% increase in FPS depending the amount of parts that your craft have. (of course you need cpu performance when your craft is big) (and you get a lot of extra parts for the same price XD) Using some mods parts: -300% less loading time and memory usage. -from 20% to 300% increase in FPS (this does not change much, becouse even if you have less memory avariable, to have extra part sizes like novapunch reduce the amount of parts that you need to launch big payloads) (you do not lose so much time searching the right part that you need in the part menu) So this mean that if you had a 600 parts craft (5 FPS) then becomes in 250 parts (15 FPS). I dont follow you.. "you cant instance them"? With procedural you reduce the amount of files that the game needs to open and close like the cfg files. The amount of textures you load to the memory. IF you are not convince how much this can help, make the test. Is easy, strechy tanks (alone) vs all vanilla plus novapunch tanks (only tanks), open the game, make a craft and fly it. You will surprice of the advantages. And strechy tanks mod is not a good example becouse it does not use standard sizes. And with procedural tanks you can use different fuels, so you do not need extra tanks for each fuel type. The bottlenecks is in the amount of parts that your craft has and the amount of extra parts that you add to the game. Procedural fix the 2 problems. How parts you made procedural? Is more easy to mentions what parts you dont, like engines, pods or some science stuff. You mention landing struts, docking ports, ladders, etc. All those can be procedural. Ladders for example is one of the most part request by the comunity (not me) to become procedural. You can also add decouplers, sas, asas, panels, etc. Is amazing how much you can reduce the part menu. Of course the parts needs to use the same 3d model. Procedural what it does is change its cfg parameters like strenght, joint nodes, scale depending on the size you choose. You can have different textures for the same part too. I am agree, I work with codes more oriented to webpages, and the optimization always is the last that you need to do.

I have to accept that the "LEGO feeling" and the damage simulation are the only 2 moderate critics that this can have. About the Lego feeling... Are you sure if that is the real factor that makes the game fun? The game is about design any kind of craft and fly it. Is not about puzzle rockets, attempts to simule a space program. And even if it is. With procedural parts you are only reducing the amount of parts that you stack. So is not something that it will change the gameplay dramatically. Plus more parts is equal to less limit to your imagination. The damage, right now is not very accurate, in the case of 3 tanks stack, you really think that the wobble between the parts looks real? Meanwhile in the real world are all made in one part and they do not bend or break with ease in the middle. In the case of wings, or any other part, it has to be a max size snapping between standard scale dimensions, so you also need to stack parts. And the game engine also allows other solutions, you can have premade damage parts in the case of the wings with certain cfg values. That part would remplace the original in a crash. You also had different assets for unity that can be download for free or paying a low cost that can solve those problem. Parts can be cut or bend. If you have 1 part, the game can cut one and make 2 parts of it. You can search damage assets in unity and you would see. There are many demos. I am not against muti core, threadding or 64b structure or anything that can help in the performance. But that feature does not depend on SQUAD. On the other hand procedural parts is something that SQUAD can manage well. They can ask for help to the community, something like "project procedural", with details and parameters made by squad meanwhile they may focus in the game content. With only this, the game performance is increased by a lot.

Ok, now I understand, it seems I dint read your first post very well. Is a great idea, but I dont know.. It seems like you are missing the oportunity to take advantage of other ways to improve the gameplay using money. For example: -You can have a list of works/task to do from the private sector, like put some satellite in certain orbit. And gain extra money with that. In that way encourage you to build a reusable rocket to put payloads in orbits. Maybe you need 3 different versions depending the payload. And if you recover the parts, is money that back to you to be used in the next mission. But if you always start with a fix amount of budget, what is the advantage to make a reusable rocket or shuttle? -You can build a space station just to be used like private turism and get extra money from that, moving turist up and down. -You can build a space solar farm with solar cells and sell that energy to kerbin. I guess the prestige has to symbolize how big is the budget that you can ask for certain mission, so if your prestige level is high you had more chances to be approved. Also can simbolize like you said a extra certain amount of money for each mission. mmm dunno.. I guess the game need to encourage the player to design new stuffs. After all the game key feature is not the missions, is the design. I dont know how he can focus in science and not in economics. They need to be related. For example economic is the thing that needs to limit how big are the craft that you do. Not the science! resource mining, science and economic system is something that needs to be planned all at the same time. Becouse they are related.

Yeah I like GavinZac idea, the thing that I do not understand very well what is the difference between prestige and budget? Becouse they are directly related. I think that once a budget system is implemented they need to change how science works. Right now unlock an extra tank size doing science is silly, science needs to represent better engines (higher isp), lighter materials, reduce on costs to old materials, new parts in the case that is a new way to do science or new technologies. Becouse the economic is the thing that would restrict the size of your craft.

I will keep saying this until some dev reply. All the things in your list can be solved if we remplace most parts for procedural parts that will snap between standard sizes. Also we would have a lot of extra parts and sizes to use, our crafts will look more real and any upgrade on the physsics models would be easier to update.

Yeah I was thinking is something similar. I would like to see how SQUAD plains to merge the science system with the Resource and economics system. I guess only in that step will have sense. Now looks like silly, I would said almost ARCADE the way that science is manage it. Science is not about unlocking different sizes in tanks or different proportions in adapters, etc. When they implement an economic system, that would be the limit about the sizes of the things that we can build. Not the science.. With science you can have different kinds of engines, with more or less efficiency, you can have solar cells with less or more efficiency. You can reduce the cost of old technologies at the same time you open some high cost new technologies. That is the science factor.. Not just unlock a minitank fuel when you already had different sizes. SQUAD wants to make a game that simulates a space program. Well I guess they need to do that.

I read yours, did you read mine? I am not talking about how the game can load or unload parts. Your solution is only partial. Maybe if you read my first comment on this thread you will know what I am talking about.

Like I said 2 post back, dynamic parts is the ONLY solution that will make a real difference solving all the problems that the game has. Of course this problem can be tackled from various fronts, but even if you choose other ways to do that, this bottle neck on parts will remain there and a huge oportunity to improve even more the game performance and experience will be waste it. Why is so hard to see it?

The best and the only (I guess) solution is the one that I suggest in this discussion thread: Even if one day we can address more than 4 GB in KSP, that it will NOT be the solution. The game is wasting a lot of resources (and game experience) in how it manages the parts. We can not have extra standard dimenssions to provide our rockets a more real shape and design, and this will be a BIG issue if some day SQUAD fix the drag model. Making almost all parts size dynamics jumping between standard sizes will give a HUGE game performance (loading time, FPS, etc). In comparisson with someone who already use 200 extra mod parts it will notice a game load time 4 or 5 times lower and a huge increase of FPS flying crafts. Also in comparisson to someone who only use vanilla, it will also notice a big improvement, with a good addiction of extra parts. This for me is undeniable. And makes me sad to imagine that no one from SQUAD is even considering this option.

OMG, that was fast.

i will download this when the recovery system is finish.. I dont see the point until then. But I like the economic addiction, carrer mode without that is silly.

I use the CRAY TITAN supercomputer from Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Processors: 6274 AMD Opteron of 16 cores Video: 18688 GPUs Nvidia Tesla K20 17,59 petaFLOPS Memory 710 TiB (598 TiB CPU y 112 TiB GPU) I build a SSTO airplane with 500 parts and run it at 15 FPS :S So I guess the game still needs to be optimized.