giltirn

I agree, its very difficult to make precise burns with even very slightly asymmetric ships in 0.21. Constantly fighting to hold a course saps all the fun from flying.

0.21.1 SAS is definitely an improvement over 0.21.0 but as others have pointed out, it still does not properly align the attitude at the point at which the controls were released; it is always a few degrees off. Also I am having difficulty with some large planes where the control surfaces flap about madly, and the SAS fights me trying to raise the nose. If I disable SAS I have more than enough control surfaces to raise the nose without difficulty, so I have no idea why this is happening. Edit: as before, this may only be an issue with a certain subset of players, so please, if it works for you don't fill up the forum with posts saying "It's working fine for me, you're just doing it wrong." - just keep it to yourselves and let people with problems post.

[Operating System]: Windows 7 Professional 64-bit [Memory]: 16GB [ASAS Trouble (Y/N)]: Yes [Mods installed, pre-patch]: N/A (fresh install) [Mods installed, post-patch]: None [Description of problem (keep it short)]: SAS controller settles on a heading different from the heading upon releasing manual control. Settling on new heading is quite slow. Does not maintain heading in space under thrust.

Phew, I also managed to kill Jeb while trying to land my SSTO - I'm glad he will be reanimated!

I cannot replicate that behavior on the Aeris 3A or Ravenspear Mk4 - in both cases the 5 degree bounce-back occurs after a 30 degree pitch adjustment.

I just went out flying the Ravenspear Mk4. On this plane the bounceback upon releasing the controls after changing direction is less harsh than on the Aeris 3A. One thing I did observe: when you adjust the pitch, the control surface angle changes to about 30 degrees. With SAS on, releasing the pitch control causes the control surface to reset its angle to zero before slowly climbing back to its original angle again. What I think is happening is that the SAS sets the trim to maintain a fixed direction. It seems that it always resets the trim to zero prior to performing its adjustments, irrespective of the initial angle of the control surface when the player releases the control.

Yes, me too.

Hi HarvesteR, here are my observations from performing the tests you describe: Fresh install of KSP from Steam (deleted directory first), Windows 7, no mods or parts packs. I launched the Aeris 3A and leveled it out (did not touch controls to yaw or roll the plane). Left SAS off. Firstly I did not see the tendency for the plane's nose to drop - it stays very level but does want to seem to roll slightly in a clockwise direction and also yaw in the same direction (which may be induced by the roll). Even after first rolling the plane anticlockwise past the horizontal point, the plane continued to try to roll and yaw in the clockwise direction. Activating SAS and pitching up from horizontal to 30 degrees, then releasing the pitch control, the nose immediately bounces back down towards the rising velocity vector (much as it does without SAS active), before settling at around 25 degrees pitch. After every adjustment of direction, the SAS always bounces back slightly before settling - a behavior others have observed. The bouncing seems worse when making only small adjustments.

It's clear that SAS no longer holds the course of the spacecraft while under thrust, and constant manual adjustments are required. I have yet to hear whether this is intentional, however C7's blog states: "This allows you to pilot to a new stable course, and have the sas automatically "lock" back on to that position. However, the new controller is not designed to be a full autopilot. It will just help to maintain stable control.". The first sentence suggests that the SAS is intended to lock the heading, in which case it is not working. The second and third sentences however are massively ambiguous, and people keep throwing them around as 'proof' that C7 didn't intend the SAS to maintain a heading (although what use is it otherwise??). I can only hope C7 comes along and clears this up.

Why does my symmetrical spaceplane constantly turn while under thrust (in vacuum)? It's virtually impossible to do precision maneuvers when you are constantly fighting to hold a course. I thought the improved SAS was supposed to be better!?

Will you people PLEASE stop spreading this misconception. ASAS did not ever in the history of the universe add torque to anything!!. Torque only ever came from command pods (and in a much older update, apparently, SAS modules -- read; not ASAS). ASAS was a computer with software that controlled aerodynamic surfaces and RCS as well as command pod torque to maintain the heading of your ship. That's it. In 0.21, command pods and reaction wheels add torque. What is now called SAS does not add torque, it merely uses the command pod/reaction wheel torque, along with RCS and aerodynamic control surfaces to cancel rotation around axes other than the axis upon which the player is trying to turn the vehicle.

I wonder if the reason that the devs have been reluctant to give us a progress update on resources is that kethane mod just keeps showing them up?

Very happy chicken here! Thanks a lot nobody44, you're a legend

I disagree that the whole point of career mode is to add 'consequences' to your actions. I am interested in career mode as a mode that offers challenges of ever growing complexity in which a particular problem must be solved; that of building a craft capable of doing a particular job within a particular budget, and then carrying out that task. Its a channel for creativity - it gives you a purpose that sandbox is lacking. I am not interested in being forced to grind easier challenges just to recover from some silly error; I don't want to be punished for the inevitable mistake. That is not fun for me, and I'm sure many others agree. This kind of debate has been happening for years in the gaming community, within all genres. There are 'hardcore' people who like the idea of a completely unforgiving game that lets them feel superior for having trodden where lesser mortals failed to reach. Then there are 'softcore' people who enjoy a challenge but don't want to be punished for making a mistake. I think it's clear from HarvesteR's recent blog that they want to please both camps, and are hence allowing for 'rewinding time' while also allowing for the option to turn it off as a difficulty setting - then we can all be happy. Maybe the hardcore users can create their own forum where they can boast about their achievements and be insulated from the softcore cheaters who did not have to work so hard to accomplish those goals.

Surely if you implement a rewind option then only the people who want to use it will; those that prefer to play hardcore will not? Also, if you can still build and launch ships with a negative bank balance, then is the balance itself not just a meaningless number; more like a score to show off to others rather than something that affects the game?

You might want to read HarvesteR's latest dev blog http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/entry.php/550-Rethinking-the-way-flights-end, in which he flat out states that players will be able to (i quote) "freely retry a failed mission without consequence".

Well real-life space programs are not managed by one person, and are so automated that the chances of any preventable mistakes are slim to none. Even the Apollo program was mostly automated, the astronauts, while trained to take over in case of computer failure, were mainly there for the ride. People are not robots, and will make mistakes (apart from asmi, who is clearly a god among men ), and in general games-players do not like to be punished for their mistakes by long periods of grinding. Of course this is your mod, and you can do with it as you will. I was just hoping for the option of being able to retry as a crutch for players such as myself who have limited playing time and are not particularly concerned about being called a chicken by the forum ubermensch.

This is true, although having the ability to try again would make testing easier and also would allow people to recover from dumb mistakes.

Sometimes mistakes cannot easily be anticipated at launch. For example, last night while attempting the Vostok I mission I did my gravity turn too quickly and accidentally caused the rocket to spin out of control. While the hardcore among us will say 'suck it up', I personally prefer to have the option to try again. It just adds a layer of tedium having to grind easy missions to get back money due to a simple slip-up, and at the early stages of your space program the losses can be quite severe. Unfortunately the alternative you suggested will not work for suborbital flights. Perhaps you could just add the ability to save and reload the campaign status for the softcore losers among us that need such crutches?

I disagree. Most games offer the ability to try something again if you screw up - despite this they still offer a challenge. Sometimes people make silly mistakes (for example they accidentally muck up the staging or forget to lock the gimbal on their mainsails) or some freak wobble causes something to break off at launch. Currently the mod punishes you for such things, which seems unnecessary to me.

Is there some way of aborting a mission without losing the launch costs? I'm not really interested in being punished if my design doesn't work out. Edit: for clarification, I mean that after I have launched I want to be able to 'rewind' back to the launch pad and have the costs of the launch refunded.

I use Hack Gravity to test the RCS distribution of my landers, sometimes enable part clipping to mount a part that refuses to attach even though it really should (I'm talking to you, stacked radial-mounted fuel tanks!) and I have hacked the craft file to remove an annoying struct connector stub that was impossible to click on in the VAB. I wouldn't consider those 'cheating' as such.

Thanks for the answers guys. I have used chase cam for docking, but I haven't tried it when landing as I prefer a side-on view in order to judge how far above the ground I am.

Hi all, While I have become relatively proficient at using the navball, some things still confuse me. 1) Why is the 'east' line 90 degrees anticlockwise of the north line?? 2) Is there any way, other than trial and error, to determine what the compass directions are relative to the orientation of the camera? I find docking and hovering about moons extremely difficult because I have no way of telling what direction my ship is going to turn when I press WSAD. I would appreciate any help!

The hardest part during the hover/apply thrust diagonally part is figuring out exactly what direction you need to turn your ship. AFAIK there is no way to see what compass direction the camera is facing, so the navball is pretty much useless. I have tried in the past using trial and error but always end up crashing. It would be wonderful if there was some way of projecting the compass directions into the camera view, it would make this, and docking, so much easier.