asmi

Maybe, but it's very convenient as the same overlay works not only in map view, but in "vessel view" as well making landings on resources a breeze.

Maybe you can try this: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/showthread.php/31831-Is-there-a-way-to-change-stock-shader-for-the-celestials-in-map-view ?

"Chicken mode"

The best approach is to time your launch. However, it's possible to adjust your LAN afterwards by burning NORMAL+/- at most northern/southern points of your orbit.

Well if we talke a look at real life, the only (partially) reusable that was in service turned out to be vastly more expensive than ELVs. However I agree that %%recovered should be distance-dependent since transporting stuff to KSC costs money. I think for anything within few kilometers (since we're talking about not only space planes that can easily be controlled to land at runway, but also capsules which are much harder to target precisely - I myself after numerous tries can manage only ±10 kms precision) of KSC we should be able to recover 100% of costs, and percentage should decrease as we go farther from KSC. Water landing should be further penalized as there is always some damage from water, not to mention water recovery is more expensive in terms of hardware involved (naval vessels vs truck/helicopter). BTW this sounds like a good idea for the mission - build craft to recover something on the surface of Kerbin and bring it to KSC (using KAS for example to grab stuff). However since I play with FAR, it will be much much harder for me to build anything flight-worthy that is also able to bring stuff home, so we need to really think about balancing this. Maybe mod can detect a presence of FAR and adjust rewards?

No, I'm not a god, I just use a good strategy to achieve results, that's it. And the mod already gives you the option of trying again - it allows you to go into negatives - think of it as "stabilization credit", that you have to repay. _this_ is your punishment and at the same time insentive to perform better. I play with FAR and that itself add more complications (need to have fairings, for one) on top of already challenging environment that this mod offers, and that forces to _think_ before doing something - like it is in real life. And that is what I love the most about this mod - it's more about strategy than about anything else.

There are very good reason why I'm offering it the way I offer it. This is a position of a chicken - "What if I screw it up?" - well you've gotta pay for your screw ups. I have built a launcher that always successfull, without any problems. There were minor issues in the beginning, but once I ironed out these bugs it performs perfect! It already logged 20 missions, 100% success. No as far as I know I only know of this one: http://kerbalspaceprogram.com/nt-space-program-mission-controll-mission-pack/

I use MechJeb's Smart ASS in surface mode to control vehicle during ascent as it's may more precise than I ever will be manually. You can try doing the same.

The best course of action at first is to replicate some real-life vehicle. Then once you get this done and flying, you can start experimenting. ferram, I wonder if it would be possible to replicate this with FAR: This thing flies like its designers somehow changed laws of physics! I love this!

That kills the whole point of this mod, which is to simulate a real space program. The way real one works is - you develop LV on your own dime, and then you're getting money back for flying successful missions. So this forces you to think about functionality over "prettiness", also you _need_ to do test launches with mock payloads or without payload at all. But since test launches involves flying hardware and spending fuel, you _have to_ pay for it. That's the way I do it - I do test launches with as cheap payloads as I can come up with, and only after I'm satisfied that LV works I take a mission.

Yea and they are just as unrealistic

THAT is one hell of SRB.

Speaking of fines - I think you should introduce fines on behalf of GreenPeace for every debris left in orbit during the mission (this one is easy - save all debris that existed at the beggining of the mission, then upon completion check if there are any new debris that is in stable orbit), and perhaps for anything dropped over land (this one might be tricky to implement though) Also - would it be possible to implement missions that would require player to put certain vessel (that is shipped with the mission pack as .craft file) into certain orbit? This would be much more like IRL ComSat missions - right now you can complete this mission even with single probe body and some battery, without antennas/solar panels...

This is actually not realistic. Rockets don't fly without fuel just because someone declared that this is a "test" launch. In real life this issue is usually alleviated by using super-cheap mock payloads instead of real ones, testing first stage without the second one in suborbital tests, etc. There is actually a whole world of potential clever concepts to be invented to make test launches as cheap as possible. I think it has to stay the way it is now - launch is launch. The only possible exception would be launch abort - since nothing is launched, there are no expenses. I wasted quite some money on these "launches without actual launch", as I usually do vessel checkup on the pad - checking action groups, LAS/LES if applicable, etc. Other than that - it's awesome mod, thanks for bringing it up!

Well, technically it can't be like real one since there was no real one

Nope. Example - put human on top of rocket engine and start it up - he will be dead. Put him on top of heavy fuel tank and the same engine - and he survives Acceleration is everything. Breakdowns in rigid bodies are caused by stress caused by uneven acceleration in different parts of that body. More acceleration - more acceleration differential (initially only the layer that is directly affected by the force moves, while the rest of the body stays at the same place - remember, mass is measure of inertia, so there is greater strain between that layer and the rest of the body).

I use them when my mainline LV can't lift the payload I want it too. Kinda like Atlas-V design - base core does most of the work, but for more heavy payloads it's TWR get dangerously close to 1, so I use SRBs to get it rolling. By the time of SRB burnout, TWR is sufficiently above 1 to complete ascent. I don't like building new rockets for each and every launch, so I have a number of "base" LVs for different payload classes and various fairing sizes handy in Subassembly, in case it's neccesary I augment them with SRBs (usually two to four are enough). This approach have a benefit of having a fleet of flight-tested LVs ready to do what you need it to, and also I know optimal ascent profiles for each of them, which ensures success (I play with FAR, so maintaining optimal trajectory is important to ensure rocket doesn't tip over).

To those who offering "phantom" planet to simulate Lagrange points - do you actually know how they work? L4/5 actually repells body out of that point (so it would be "anti-gravity"), and L1-L3 repells them in two directions and attract in two others. So there is only one way to get them - is to convince Squad to implement proper n-body physics (or it might be possible to implement in a mod?). People suggesting that it would "melt your computer" simply don't know what they are talking about. Orbiter has it implemented for years and it works fine even on 7-years old computer (and yes, it DOES have time warp). There is no question of whether it's possible - it's just requires some effort to implement. There are tons of papers on this matter.

Nope, that's not the way it works. Acceleration effectively increase mass, so things break more easily. It never is that force does something - it's always acceleration.

Hi Ferram! I wonder if you've ever considered "FAR'azing" BobCat's Buran? I've just tried flying it, and I even managed to get it to orbit with no issues (just had to be VERY careful with steering), but during reentry it turns read-end first and no RCS nor anything else I could think of helped to turn it around the way it's supposed to fly. If you would be so kind to provide configs for that, I'd be the happiest person on the planet! I really love Buran, the way it flies, its' cargohold is roomy enough to assemble ISS, but having FAR renders it useless as I can't land it

Not sure what the quote has to do with Dragon/Cygnus, both of which are berthed to CBM port, so there is enough hatch clearance, but they still can't carry ISPRs due to other factors unrelated to hatch type. Hence my original phrase "there is more into it than hatch size".

Both Dragon and Cygnus have CBM hatch, yet they can't carry ISPRs.

That's right in theory, but Dragon (nor Cygnus) is not able to transport ISPRs. The only vehicle that is able to carry them onboard now is HTV. There is more into it than hatch size.

No, I use existing (VERY preliminary) support for resources, or some part of it that allows one to specify second texture that will then be alpha-blended with terrain during rendering pass. What? Theoretically Unity allows you to set whatever shader you want to anything, but there is one caveat - since OpenGL doesn't support Cg for shaders directly (unlike Direct3D that supports HLSL), you can't create Cg shaders dynamically. I didn't pursue this way since I've found easier way to solve my problem Yea I'm used to using decompilers at work as it's the best way to figure out how exactly some third-party component works.

What's interesting is vast majority of "purists" aka "stock-only" players haven't actually tried using mods. How do I know that - I was "purist" before I've tried mods, and now I can't play without some of them (first and foremost, FAR). I even have some mods that I've done myself