RatchetinSpace

Quite agree. Prehaps Kerbals build massive underground nests like ants.....

The only problem with this idea is that the runways at these cities are going to end up longer than the cities themselves. The KSC runway is more than 2.5 km long, and the island airstrip is over 1km. Unless you want Kerbin's major cities with runways fit only for model aeroplanes, or you want runways that look ludicrously long compared to the city itself, you'd just have to make much bigger cities than 1km across. The problem is, Kerbin is just a lot smaller than Earth. It's only 1/10th the radius, but alot of people don't realise that equates to about 1/100th the surface area. If Kerbin had the same population density of Earth, it would have a population of just 62 million. Yet despite how small Kerbin is, the physics of flight remain the same as on Earth, so runways need to be just as long. Anyway, if cities were to be added into the game I would hope they'd be much bigger than 1km. 20km2 would roughly equate to Tokyo on Kerbin.

I've always wanted cities for Kerbin, the issue is, to add enough buildings to make them good, and to add enough variety to make them worth visiting, and to place them all over Kerbin would be an enormous undertaking on the dev's side of things. Plus, I'm not sure that everyone's computer is up to rendering several thousand buildings at a time, maybe not even the game engine. You could fix this by making cities togglable, but then, whats the point of working so long on something that most people will leave turned off due to memory and performance issues. Frankly I can't see this being added to the game. Prehaps some community modders could get together with something like the KerbinSide or Kerbtown mods to make some modded cities, but considering how quickly those mods died down their promises to make full Kerbal cities I don't think it'll happen in the foreseeable future. I do want Kerbal cities, but I think its a lot of work to add what you're talking about to the game. PS: Your English is pretty good

Can we just get this guy on the dev team....like....right now? Come on, we need your vision!

I completely agree. Landing on planets is a lot harder in real life than it is in this game, and adding some of the hazards plagued in real life could be good for this game. The crew of Apollo 11 had to steer their lander offcourse because their computer was landing them in very rocky terrain, the Curiosity rover had to implement a sky crane so the delicate instruments wouldn't be damaged by dust created by the rockets. Haphazardly plunging a probe with 10 parachutes into Duna's atmosphere to just land softly doesn't seem fair in my opinion, it should be a lot harder to get something to the surface.

Clouds, definately. More so I would love a full weather system; Wind, Rain, Storms, etc. Duna duststorms, the surface of eve covered by thick clouds, rain and storms on Laythe, massive Jool storms just like Jupiter As for city lights...no way. They are so out of place when you go in for landing only to find that the brightly lit continent is really completely abandoned. I would like them if there were actual cities but I think that's pushing the developing capabilities of squad at the moment.

Hey, I love your planet pack. Its nice to see planets which are proper colours and moons with atmospheres I downloaded it and launched an Ion probe to visit all the planets. I didn't manage to visit Lomina (because of its high inclination) but I visited all the others and two moons as well, before parking in a polar orbit around Semth. While I played, I recorded the footage and put it in a montage for anyone who wants to take a look, or is struggling to get out so far. I used all stock parts. Sorry its a bit long. I hope you continue development on this mod or your RSS planet pack. I haven't downloaded that one as I don't really play Real Solar System, it'd be nice if you made a Kerbal sized version of your RSS but I know you're already doing alot.

I think weather would be a really good mechanic to make current places more interesting and give more stuff to do. Rain and storms could make for fantastic views and wind and air pressure differentials would make for a fantastic game play experience, making landing on planets with atmospheres a lot more challenging than just 'spamming parachutes'. I do agree we should add planets though. Atleast two, One Saturn analogue and an Ice giant analogue, or maybe the planet discussed by devs earlier which would have an extremely thick atmosphere and lots of gravity. Along with the Saturn planet an extensive moon system. Ice gypsters on moons, asteroids to mine in orbit, it'd be great. I personally think the devs should focus on both adding more planets and also adding weather of some sort. The current mods available are a bit too buggy and don't add stock-alike planets (I'm not a fan of rainbow moons) and don't extensively simulate weather the way I think an immersive experience should.

I say to hell with it and make a second gas giant. Adding a Saturn analogue makes room for many more moon opportunities.

A few members of the KSP community have been asking for new planets for a while, but the discussion was always around improving the old planets vs adding more. I personally would like to see both, however I'll get back to that. Currently, Kerbin has no clouds or weather patterns of any kind, which are a very real thing in the actual Spacecraft and Aircraft industry, launches are often cancelled or delayed due to poor weather conditions and planes have to take wind and turbulence into consideration when taking off and landing. Also I think weather would make a great visual difference to the game. The space center (and whole of Kerbin for that matter) always look the same, light or dark with the occasional sunset and sunrise, imagine what I'd look like with rain and thunderstorms. I'm not saying add tornadoes that damage your space centre or anything crazy, just weather patterns which make for variety in every launch. The weather system could then be applied to all planets and moons with atmospheres, imagine a probe trying to make a pin-point landing through a Laythe thunderstorm, a rover in the thick of a Duna dust storm, a probe measuring the intense winds in Jool's upper atmosphere, or even a space plane having to land on the KSC runway when dealing with freak wind conditions. And weather isn't the only thing planets could be enhanced by, geological features on far away worlds are what differentiate them from each other. Volcanoes on Io and Venus, moving ice sheets and subsurface oceans on Europa and Enceladus and aurora at the poles of Jool and Kerbin. What I'm trying to say here, is I think there should be more to do and more rewards for landing worlds far away, expending thousands of m/s of Delta V. Now I've been talking a lot about enhancing the current celestial bodies, but there is also the question of adding new ones. For a while a second gas giant has been proposed for the Kerbol System, along with possibly another large terrestrial planet in the outer solar system. The second gas giant would be an analogue of Saturn and have rings and an extensive moon system. This was discussed a while ago, and I hope that Squad is still interested in this implementation. While planet-packs are great and interesting to play around with, a stable, In-Game Saturn analogue and Ice-giant analogue I think is in order for a number of reasons. 1. A planet as far out as these two worlds would further encourage players to learn the concepts of gravity assists, which would be mostly necessary because of the Delta V requirements 2. A planet that far out would also encourage players to establish more permanent fuel outposts and mining establishments. From my experience, manned missions to Laythe's surface and back are possible with SSTO's and a greater challenge for Delta V requirements would, I think, boost the number of people using space stations and mining bases. 3. Rings are gorgeous, and would add a great visual element to the game. No-one can deny that a ringed gas planet in KSP would be beautiful and I think this planet would become the screenshot central of KSP 4. Rings also offer more opportunities for Science gathering 5. Two more worlds makes for more diversity. Those far away worlds make for a new class of long-haul mission that I think could be inspiring for new players and challenging for the older players. I fully acknowledge the planet packs out there that many people work long hours developing. I have tried them and had a lot of fun, but the stock planets, the ones which come with the game I download I think are incomplete in scope and in depth. I don't want just some coloured balls to plant a flag on, I want other worlds. Worlds which are wondrous, beautiful and unique. I want to send robots there to do Science, I want to set Kerbals on their surfaces so they too can take one more giant step for Kerbal kind. I know that Squad puts lots of time and effort into developing this game and every update has come with exciting things for me and so many others to enjoy. I have loved computer games before I went to school and I love Science and Astronomy with all of my heart and seeing those two things combine has been an awesome experience for me. I hope Squad will read this and get something out of it. As for the forum user who has read through this whole thing (thank you), what is your opinion on this topic? Are the celestial bodies detailed enough? Are they numerous enough?

Love it, Love it, Love it. Most planet mods have wild and wacky planets that don't make sense and rainbow and all that jazz. While I don't mind that, for me, this is the perfect mod. All the planets are semi-scientifically accurate and they look like actual planets IRL. Props to you devs! Keep up the good work!

Are you talking about the cars which use hydrogen to run a generator that powers motors? If thats the case Hydrogen is way better than electics in my opinion. Electric cars are heavy which makes them inefficient. They are also bad for the environment because their batteries use hazardous materials and the walls they plug into are supplied by coal power plants mostly. Electric cars also take a long time to charge up, meaning you can't go on long drives. The batteries in electric cars also deteriorate quickly. Hydrogen is abundent on Earth thanks to our large supply of water. Hydrogen goes into the car just like petrol and can run the car for a similar distance. If it runs out you can just refuel. Hydrogen cars don't need lots of batteries like electric cars so they can last longer without servicing. Finally Hydrogen is completely clean energy that doesn't require sourcing the power grid which currently runs off of coal and other fossil fuels. I think in the future our power plants will use hydrogen fuel cells (If we don't work out fusion) and our cars will also run on the stuff. The apparent dangers of hydrogen are exactly the same as those with gasoline, so theres nothing new to combat. And best of all, we already have fuel stations set up all over the world. We can just slowly convert them to hydrogen pumps as more and more people use it over the ever rising price of gasoline. Of course I'm not saying electric cars don't have their place. The relationship between hydrogen and electric cars will mirror that of diesel and petrol cars. Electric cars will be good for shot commutes while hydrogen will power our trucks that need to go long distance and our trains that can't stop to recharge. Now I think about it.....as fuel prices rise, planes need a new fuel source.....what will that be? Probably not electricity or hydrogen, because they both use electric motors. Anyway, thats my thoughts on it.

Not to be a spoil sport but I really don't think we need better art for the buildings and parts, its great the way it is with exceptions of the unfinished cockpits which will hopefully be in the 1.0 update. I also don't think we need simple life support. If it were to be in the game however have it as a tolerable option, some people want their kerbals to go interstellar and life support doesn't scale up very well. A KAS in the stock game seems a bit op, just because it makes docking ports almost pointless and there's an aspect of challenge to designing a spacecraft to work with just docking ports and the ARM I think we're near to the max amount of engines we need, though I do agree with maybe two more SRB's and an inline mono prop engine however thats all I would like to see in the game. Otherwise I like the list, especially the improved water and weather. Weather on other planets would just be awesome. Of course this is just my opinion. Feel free to oppose me everyone! - - - Updated - - - If they did add geysers and volcanoes to other planets and moons (like laythe and kerbin and eve) it would add much more dynamics to the planets. Right now it feels like they are just rocks for you to land on, not active, breathing wonder worlds to be explored. I would fully support volcanoes and geysers in the game, however I think you're right in saying it may take time from squads development. If they found a way to do it easily without taking too much time from the games development that would be great! Maybe it'd be something to work on while developing weather? Just an idea

I ment this poll more on the point of realistic types of planets and realistic formations, rather than realistic distances

It takes a trained eye to know when to turn over, however people have done the maths on the issue. Ideally you want to turn slowly and gradually along your entire launch however that's not always possible, especially with experimental craft. My advice would be to throttle up to max until your spacecraft reaches 150m/s, then throttle down to about 2/3rds or slow enough so you don't accellerate away from 150m/s too fast. Now wait till you reach 200m/s and then throttle back to stop going any faster. Once you reach about 9km then begin to slowly tilt over, once you reach 10km you should be at around 15 degrees. At 12 km roughly 20~30 degrees, now throttle up to max and slowly pitch over to past the 45 degree mark. I personally like to stay in around the 65 degree mark but your craft might not have the TTWR to sustain that so just keep your craft accelerating sideways and gaining apogee. Once you've reached your desired altitude for your obit, cut the engines. Of course, this is just what I would do, many people have different opinions and its a debated topic. I would say that if your craft can get in orbit, its a successful launch and if you don't have enough fuel just add more boosters. Scott Manley has a great video on youtube discussing this topic. He recommends that as a rule of thumb, start turning at 10km. Hope this was helpful!

Craft come to me two ways: If the class I'm in is boring then I'll usually pull out my text book and scribble down a design for a craft. I tend to draw out the mission first and all the manouvers I'll have to complete to get there and then design a mission profile from there on. If I want to build a utilitarian craft like an SSTO or launch vehicle I'll usually just jump into ksp and let the parts and struts fly. I then test over and over and over again, every system and subsystem and backup subsystem must be tested to make sure it will work, and I use MechJeb for my delta V calculations. Once I'm sure it will work I launch it and start the mission. Knowing me though there will probably still be something wrong that I over looked.

I LOVE this comment, so true. There are some really weird stuff out there in the universe that we don't understand.

I've been playing a lot of modded ksp, particularly messing around with kopernicus and people adding new planets. I'm still a noob at making planets and I'm still getting used to it. In the spirit of new planets though, does the ksp community want semi-realistic planets and moons that make sense in the real world or wacky planets with gas giant double systems and moons with rings. Comment below!

Your math is correct, however the man claiming to make an orbital craft that meets 0.2 c needs to consider the problems with interstellar travel. You're going 0.2 c AT KERBIN. Anyone who has travelled to Eeloo will know that the gravity from Sol takes its toll on the speed of your ships. I was warping for hours because my craft had slowed down to 500m/s due to Sol's gravity despite leaving kerbin going 5000m/s. While thats alot slower than 0.2 c it shows that the gravity from the sun would slow you down escaping it and you'd have to compensate for that slowing if you want to reach another star system. Then you have to worry about slowing down (intense areobreaking will kill KSP's physics). And thats assumeing the star you reach has planets. Not all of them do and the nearest planet bearing star to Earth is a whopping 10.5 light years away.

FINALLY MADE IT TO URLUM (KSP outerplanets mod). I had serveral annoying bugs trying to get there as my craft kept on exploding in mid space but I found the solution and was able to get captured. I flew by all four moons and scanned them using scansat. Next I intend to send a twin probe to Neidon (also outerplanets mod) to study that system. There were no landers because I wanted to save weight and to be honest I didn't know what the characteristics of the moons where. I then created a system for Neidon using the kopernicus plugin because I thought it would be boring to go to a gas giant without moons. It was at that point when I realised 4 hours had passed and I needed to go to school the next day.....Ops, better get to bed

Have you made sure the mods are installed correctly? Some mod makers can be tricky and put the GameData folder inside another folder or they simply expect you to put the folder into the GameData (I know that MechJeb has to be manually dragged into GameData). This confused me to until I saw the random folders around my GameData and outside my GameData, I felt like such a noob.

Hey, I've been playing on my partially modded install, trying to get to Urlum (Outer planets mod) with a semi stock craft. I had escaped Kerbins gravity and was heading off towards the orbit of Urlum, all I had to do was make a course correction to make sure I was getting a close approach. When I got to the maneuver node I slowed down time so I could perform it when, without warning, the kraken bore down on my craft and it was in pieces. I was very disappointed but being the youthful space program I am I proceeded to try again. The same thing happened again, and again, and again. It doesn't matter where in the orbit the craft is, as long as its outside Kerbins SOI it may or may not randomly explode. I pressed F3 to see what had caused the damage and the logs say my craft either crashed into the VAB, SPH or launch pad. These are my mods: Bd armoury Better Atmospheres Camera tools Custom Asteroids Distant Object Enhancement FMRS Hullcam KAS Kerbin Side MechJeb Outerplanets mod with a modified PlanetFactory to make sure the orbits don't collide Scansat Texture Replacer TCA Toolbar Plugin Trajectories Plugin VGN The craft used parts from Scansat, Hullcam, MechJeb and KAS I removed Kerbin Side after this because I thought it might be causing the issue but after repeated testing the issue still occurred. It also happens when you reload the craft outside of Kerbin's SOI and if you quicksave outside Kerbin's SOI. I also tested to see if it was an altitude problem by modding the save folder and putting the craft on a 500000000000km orbit around the Sun and it didn't explode. The way to stop this bug from happening is if you don't go to full time accelleration. With these mods installed ksp (for some reason) invents a super fast timewarp thats really useful for getting to far away planets. This however is causing the destruction. To stop this from happening just don't use the max time warp but use the one just before it. If you accidentally use the super time warp then your mission is doomed unfortunately. It may take some time to get to your planets (especially if you are going interstellar) but use MechJeb's warpto feature and go and bake some cookies or something while you wait. Much better than getting destroyed by the kraken.

Whenever I build my rovers (or planes for that matter) I just set up the action groups so the brake button only activates the back breaks. Anyone who has ever ridden a bike will tell you its next to impossible to tip your vehicle end over end if only the back breaks are firing.

This is a fantastic mod! Thanks so much! I was worried I'd have a billion mods that I had no idea how to use, this is a good way to cut down on that

Oh my goddess, and the white spot is the wreck of the Spirit of Kerbin, I guess he'll have to hide on Pluto now, until new horizons finally arrives