Talisar

And, sooner than expected, here is the rework of the arch section: DOWNLOAD This one is just a model replacement. As with the cargo bay, please install over the current pack, overwriting when necessary. This version has simplified colliders, but still includes colliders for the curvy arc pieces. And now for my testing pics: I built this, and when in the VAB I did get quite a bit of lag when picking up and moving the entire stack, but when placed back down it all went away: Then I took it to the launchpad and tested it to destruction, got zero lag while doing so: It was spectacular Again, please give these parts a test and let me know your thoughts. If necessary, I will remove the colliders from the curvy arch pieces altogether, but (in my install anyhow) I find the lag when moving multiple of these pieces annoying, but not a game breaker. Your input would be appreciated.

Ok, here's the rework of the cargo bay: DOWNLOAD The download only includes the new cargo bay model, texture, and configs. Please install over the current versions and allow it to overwrite when asked. I believe this iteration should minimize, if not eliminate, the lag issues caused by the cargo bay. I built this in the VAB. 18 of the cargo bays together. Had very little lag when moving the stacks around (just a slight hiccup when picking up the entire assembly, no more than usual for picking up large stacks of parts), no appreciable lag when I exited and re-entered the VAB to make them all animate at once. Then I attached them all to an action group and opened them on the launchpad without a hitch. I'd appreciate those of you specifically having issues with the cargo bay trying this one out and letting me know what you think.

Just using FireSpitter for the animation This is what is confusing me, because I haven't changed anything at all about the cargo bays since the 0.1.1 update. Model/config/animations, etc all exactly the same ones. about the arch colliders, if necessary I can just remove them completely for that section of the model and that will likely fix the lag from those parts. The colliders for the sides and top are simple boxes (as Tallinu noted). The arches will be there visibly, but kerbals will be able to pass straight through them. You should have seen the lag on the initial version before I replaced the side colliders, even on my relatively beefy rig. On a side note, I'm slightly offended that no one has noticed that I made the sides of the vertical trusses act as ladders yet I thought that was pretty cool.

Ok, I've gone back and looked, and the version of the cargo bay in the packs has been the same one since v0.1.1 (which I had thought corrected the VAB lag when opening/closing the doors). @MaverickSawyer and @Tallinu - has the slowdown been consistent for each iteration of the pack, or did it go away and come back after an update? @JustinKerbice - Has the VAB lag returned for you since the v0.1.1 update? In any case, I'll rework the colliders on that part as well and see if I can do anything about simplifying the animation (it's my first animated part, so it's likely there's a lot I can fix there) As for the arches, my plan is for the next iteration to have simplified colliders, but still retain them on the curved arches ('cuz I think it's cool ), but if there are still issues I can remove the colliders from those sections completely. Ultimately I expect I'll have to settle on the second option, but it has a -10 to coolness factor.

Yeah, the collider on the arches is fairly detailed. I am going to be condensing the texture maps on these pieces next, and believe I can simplify their colliders some more, and if necessary I can remove the collider from the orange curved pieces altogether. I need to make another pass at the cargo bay to fix that flipped normal, so I'll work on fixing the issue with that as well. I had fixed it before (I think) so I believe I probably accidentally reverted to the previous version. I've also improved the textures on the new adapters/separators a little, and I'll include those when I update after working on the above issues.

... and the enemy's gate is 'down'!

Updated to v0.3.1. Changelog: v0.3.1 (04/30/14) WILL STILL BREAK ANY CRAFT PRIOR TO v0.3.0 - Added configs for parts intended for use with 3.75m craft back in. Sorry for the oversight. v0.3.0 (04/30/14) CRAFT BREAKING UPDATE - New models for adapters and separators. They are a bit thinner, and the textures are even uglier for the time being. THIS UPDATE WILL BREAK ANY CRAFT USING THE PREVIOUS ADAPTERS AND SEPARATORS! - Added hollow separator ring and hollow docking ring. This ring is specifically designed for use with these parts and will not dock with standard docking adapters. If there is interest, I will make versions compatible with and sized to standard docking adapters. - Included an adapter that is designed to be used in conjunction with Kerzamit's procedural fairings (fairings not included) - Be advised that this update will break any craft that are using the previous iteration of adapters and separators. Edit!!! Lightning fast update!

Ahh, I see. That's the way that I thought the effects were, but I didn't know the reasons behind it. I also thought that the physics started getting wonky much sooner. Still, that definitely gives me some room to play with. The standard size ones seem to be working fine for the normal kerbal scale ones I've been working with now, but we'll need to move up for YANFRET's Monkey system specs. I appreciate the info! I'm glad you like it! I was starting to think that I was the only one re: suits and logo - Nah, I've tried to come up with a logo to attach to my projects for a while, but I'm artistically challenged. Not too big a deal, as my main game setup actually has Jeb, Bill, and Bob using your stealth suits and all the other kerbals being randomly assigned suits from your megapack. Thanks though!

Sweet! It really does look much more like a plane cockpit than a spaceship one. Does this mean I get a custom pilot flightsuit?

I ran into a lot of these issues when working with my spherical tanks (I got that slight off-angle in many directions). What I do now is ensure that my collider's faces are always at 90 degrees at the 4 cardinal directions. Additionally, I *try* to have faces at exactly 45 degrees at the 4 points between them as well, whenever possible. I've found that a fairly easy workaround for this is to chamfer that edge (or edges) on the collider that is giving you the issue. It doesn't have to be much, just enough to give you a normal pointing straight out. If that area is symmetrical, the chamfer should average them perfectly.

Sweet, that is exactly what I was going to try. Thank you very much! This is something else that I was going to research. YANFRET and I were discussing this exact thing earlier. So to be clear that I understand, what you are saying is that the nodesize will not increase past 3, but the strength of that node will increase as if it had?

The main issue I've run across was when I set up more than one, there was no differentiation between the ports when trying to decouple. They were individual, but you couldn't tell which you were commanding on the right click menu.... But as I type this I think I've figured out where I went wrong. You are all witness to education happening in real time! Now I'm off to try it out! (There's no emoticon for it, so just picture a little kerbal doing the Judd Nelson fist in the air at the end of the Breakfast Club here)

I tend to use Lack Luster Labs for building homes for my travelers, and I see by your sig that you already have that one. You may also look at Porkjet's inflatable hab pack and Sumghai's Fustek Station Parts expansion pack as well.

That would be a very good configuration for stability, but the only issue that I see would be the necessity of having 2 separate docking nodes on the same part. That's never seemed to work out well for me. However, you may be the perfect person to ask about the issue, did this come up with your universal docking port set, or do you not use more than one dockingNode transform?

It wouldn't be difficult to add that functionality. The main issue was that I hadn't really intended on making a dedicated tank for the pack, since with the modular design of the pieces, there isn't really a "set" length of the saddle truss. I had figured that people would assemble their own in pretty much the same manner as I did in the pics. As there seems to be a desire for it (Looking at you, YANFRET ) I'll put it on the to-do list. -edit: Another option would be to make a special "low profile" docking port that could be surface attached to any tank you wanted, but which was thin enough to allow a 2.5m tank to be centered in the bay.

Aside from a total download count (which seems to change as you mentioned) I don't really feel that I gain any useful information from spaceport at all. For example, my most recent version of the spherical tank pack has a 5-star rating. But it tells me it has 12.8K downloads and 5 votes. Those numbers combined are useless to me, unless I assume that 5 people liked the pack so much they downloaded it 2,500 times each. I'm actually leaning toward just using Mediafire or something like that instead of spaceport in the future, as some other modders have taken to doing. -edit: Upon consideration, I see that we're starting to veer off the path of the original purpose of the thread.... Back to giving love to modders!

As someone who has put out a couple of small part packs, I'd be the first to say that getting rep from users is very welcome. However, even more useful to me personally would be a quick comment giving specific feedback about the mod in question, especially around the WIP/Initial release time and around major updates. Whether it be about something you like or dislike about the mod, and specifically why you feel that way. I don't have a huge quantity of rep points, but of the ones I've received the majority were in response to answering questions rather than having anything to do with the parts I've made (and that's fine, and more than appreciated). Recognition is a wonderful thing, but more direct feedback would generally be extremely helpful. Especially if you can tell me why you like or dislike something. Letting us know when you especially like some feature and why would be great too. The tendency, of which I am extremely guilty of as well, is for people who are generally happy with a mod to not comment beyond a quick "that's great" response. It also helps balance out the critical feedback from people who are displeased with something (which is also good feedback, but can be a bit disheartening sometimes when that's all you get) tl;dr - Rep is great, but feedback is great

I considered both of these ideas and discarded them because I thought they would be of very limited use (I should know better by now ). The fully enclosed truss I can make with a minor config edit. As for the cargo door version, the design of the arch lends itself to being converted to doors fairly easily, I think. I'll take a swing at them. Thanks, glad you guys like it. I'm really happy with the way it's turning out. Really all that is left for it is to set up the navigation alignment LED's to light up and it will be complete. It did slightly at first, but then I strutted it in. If you look closely you can see the struts (I use the ones from the KOSMOS pack because I think their end-piece model is much more realistic and non-obtrusive). The tank itself is merely a tank from the Procedural Parts Pack attached using a 1.25m decoupler from (I think) KW Rocketry. I tried a docking port there first, but the stock ones are too thick for a 2.5m part to be centered in the cargo area if I use them. I think that using sumghai's CBM's or your own docking ports would work better, but I don't have them on my testing install. I'm also thinking of doing versions of my docking ring in standard sizes for use as CBM's, as I really think the look of them is rather unique.

A little teaser album showcasing the docking ring:

Hey YANFRET, your inbox is full....again

Yeah, the larger nodes do make attachment very difficult. Starwaster is using a plugin on his on his MTV Copernicus pack that lets the nodes be size 0 in the VAB and then resizes them to be the appropriate size when launching. I need to check that out and see if it would help with this.

This is just a quick update on my thoughts about the current status of this pack and where I'm headed with it. Overall, I'm pretty happy with the current parts as far as their specific functions are concerned. I think I've come up against a wall on any new parts that would fit with them (but suggestions are always welcome). I toyed with the idea of some radial cargo bays, but in order to make them large enough to be useful they end up becoming pretty unwieldy. I may revisit that idea if I can come up with some better design ideas for them. I'm very happy with the three different truss pieces, as well as the cargo bay. Those are unlikely to be changed with the exception of improvements to textures. The same goes for the command pod now, with the exception that it is much more in need of better texturing and when I start getting really ambitious I plan on making an IVA for it. I did notice a flipped normal on the bottom of one of the cargo bay doors that I need to fix (not a huge deal, as it is probably hidden in most usage scenarios), and I'm considering a version where the doors swing out more conventionally rather than sliding in. The big thing that I will be adjusting are the adapters and separators. Functionally they do exactly what I want, but I'm not really happy with the current visual design, so I'll probably be reworking those completely. I also have the beginnings for some hollow separators and custom docking rings done as well. That being said, I have a few ideas for future additions, but they are mostly just expansions of the current ideas, such as double-width structural sections, custom decouplers, "star trusses", and the aforementioned radial cargo bays, but I think I should get the base pieces finalized before I start on those, so I can ensure a cohesive visual design. Any insights and/or suggestions on what would be useful or desired are, as always, extremely welcome.

Hmmm... I haven't even touched those since the last time when I (thought I had) corrected that issue. Maybe I accidentally included the older version when I packaged it up. I'll check it when I get home today.

Another minor update. This one only updates the command pod to my new model. Main post updated as well.

I see your point. My thought behind the design is aimed more at this being a standard orion/apollo style crew pod that includes a forward facing "cockpit seat", intended for out-of-atmosphere operations. Perhaps I could make a more aerodynamic shroud for launching. Hmm, how to explain what I mean.... With the trusses, what I am trying to accomplish is not to design a pack of parts that let you build the Copernicus. I'm trying to design a pack of parts that is aesthetically inspired by the Copernicus that can be easily used in conjunction with other parts to build ships. I don't know if I'm explaining my thoughts well. BahamutoD and Starwaster have each made very good looking packs that include saddle trusses. I am trying to provide the pieces to make your own saddle truss configuration. As for the truss pieces without the arches, I just like the way they look Plus, it's convenient sometimes to be able to approach the payload from either side (in my head, anyhow ) Yeah, that's what I *should* have done I was just being lazy and didn't pay attention.