illusori

Might be nice if it also worked as a manual checklist too, my ideal spec: It listed all the things you need to check. Things check off automatically but you can also tick them off when you're satisfied you've taken them into account. (ie "I know I don't have solar panels, that's part of the mission design but thanks for the reminder.") Those checkbox ticks do not save, so if you load another craft, they reset to unchecked, to avoid the "accidentally left everything checked" issue. Add a "check yo staging" entry, that resets to unchecked whenever you do anything that messes with staging order. Same for action groups. Plugin support: Toolbar and TAC Life support are the two ones I'd most want to see. Configuration screen that lets you set the default list of checks you want enabled for the plugin, a list that does save. I may never want to be reminded of staging (yeah right!) or struts. Yes, this allows the user to shoot themselves in the foot by permanently removing everything from the checklist and forgetting about it. That's their fault if they choose to misuse the configuration menu instead of manually ticking things off in the check list itself. 8) Just realized Haze-Zero said most of these things just above me. So, uh, "what they said".

Which I then went on to show as being the same for life-support. It's a design-time issue too. No, I said if done as a micromanagement hell it wouldn't be fun. I then showed it didn't have to be done that way. I even said in the piece you're quoting that it was addressed in my next point. Grew up on a farm actually. I didn't say build a farm in space. Stop right there. You're replying to someone who has in repeated posts, including the one you're replying to, has said the point absolutely IS NOT realism. What? No, it's a gameplay desire. To give a purpose to the difference between robotic and Kerbal exploration. To give the player more choices that have a strategic impact. Not to force them to HAVE to do things one way, but to provide an experience that has easier and harder paths to the same goal, but the freedom to choose between those paths and feel that those choices actually made a difference. Sorry if this is a little personal: but I think you've managed to ignore every single point I made in my post in that one statement. I said specifically that realism isn't the point. I didn't say I wanted to force people into "my way or the highway", I said I wanted to give people more choices, and that life support could be implemented in a way that provided those choices without restraining the freedom to do what they currently already do. I backed those statements up with examples. I don't want all the science with probes. I want BOTH probes and kerbal missions to have utility and there to be situations in which picking one over the other is advantageous... in both directions. And I will say it again, that is a gameplay consideration, not a realism one. Having one branch of choices in the game be pointless except for cosmetic reasons is simply bad game design. That doesn't mean forcing people to HAVE to do both. It just means making the choice actually be a choice between options that actually have some merit. We're not too far off the point, or maybe we're already there, where it's possible to make a life-support system that can get a manned trip to mars. That puts the tech within the themic range of KSP at the end of the tech tree. We didn't have that tech at the start of the space race. That makes it themically consistent to not be able to do it at the start of the tech tree. (Note I said "themically consistent" not "realistic", because the point is this is a game.) This gives the opportunity for a mechanic to make life-support a constraint that diminishes over the career arc, like engine and fuel tank constraints diminish as a constraint. To clearly spell that out: this means that getting to Jool early and building a colony early, is a challenge. If you don't want that challenge or don't even find it a challenge because it's a chore for you: you go later when you've unlocked the tech that is better suited to it. "You go later", that bit is important. It isn't "go play another game", it isn't "go get a mod because I've forced my way of playing the game on you". It's "you can't do that YET, but you will if you do a couple more science missions instead". That is a strategic choice: "do I go now and deal with the issues as they arise in the mission, or do I do some more preparation up front and either mitigate the issues or, with enough preparation, prevent the issues from ever arising?". That doesn't force one way of playing on people. It makes it so people can choose to play your way or play my way. It expands the different ways to play, rather than constraining them.

Going to address a bunch of replies at once, sorry if I miss some points, quoting everyone individually is a bit much like hard work so I've paraphrased in what I hope is in the spirit of what was said. 1. Life support is always consumed, so you will eventually run out: this is no fun. You already deal with this. If you don't have enough fuel to reach orbit, your mission is a failure, possibly an equally fatal one. If you don't have enough fuel to make your transfer to Eeloo or to brake at the other end, you've got a late-mission failure after a lot of play time. Same deal. The solution is the same, if you're a MOAR BOOSTERS type, then just strap MOAR SUPPLIEZ on. Likewise if you don't provide enough struts "resources" you end in fiery kerbal death. You can still take a "just keep adding more" approach if you don't enjoy trying to make an elegant rocket (I kid myself that I do, emphasis on the trying part). Now, granted, if you have a base on every planet and like the ability to forget about all the other planets in the game while you focus on setting up a new colony somewhere else, you're going to lose that ability to effectively put all the other colonies "on hold" for the duration, so that kinda brings me to my next point. 2. Resupply micromanagement of a continuous chain of tankers is no fun unless you enjoy Eurotruck Simulator. Absolutely agree, micromangement is no fun. We already have that though. If you're doing extended operations on Jool then you probably have a bunch of fuel resupply missions already. So you stick some life support tanks on there too. Job done. Actually transferring resources between docked vessels: IMO the UI needs improving so that's single click for fuel transfers already, rather than the current fiddle. Making it so that all consumables are transferred over with a single click would be nice. If you're someone who doesn't transfer fuel out in tankers, but prebudget your fuel use, well again, you just do the same with life support. It's just an additional constraint that makes it harder to get Kerbals out there than robots. If you're someone who likes Kethane and resource mining on-site, the same can be done for life-support. You require a bit more infrastructure, but the process is similar to a solution you already do. Finally there's the tech tree. Life support systems capable of getting you to the Mun and back can unlock early, meaning you can get robots out to Jool earlier than Kerbals unless you want the "grindy challenge" of endless tankers. While better closed-loop systems unlock later, making it possible to get to Jool without the grindiness. Maybe late in the tree there's permanent colony options. You still have to make the design decisions about what approach to use and when. Just as you decide what engines and tanks to use and when. 3. Why bother if it's possible to engineer a solution to all these problems, can't we just assume it's abstracted away already? Because the point isn't realism. The point is making a gameplay distinction between robotic exploration and Kerballed exploration, so that in some situations there's utility in sending a robot and in other situations there's utility in sending a Kerbal. And those situations may evolve over time: tech availability, launch windows, the mission objectives, the fun and challenge you want from the mission - they're all factors that mean that the "best" answer to the question changes. Some examples: I want to do some basic science on the moon, I don't have big engines or big tanks: I build a robotic probe and stick it on a small rocket. I want to do some complicated science on the moon and a sample return without rover tech: I need to build a lander with a Kerbal, the life support requirements mean I need to be more efficient with my fuel use or build a bigger rocket than the robot one: a challenge! I want to get to Duna and back, I still don't have big enough rocket parts to get that much life-support over there, I'm going to have to send robots, or maybe I need to build a staging area in orbit and assemble the vehicle with multiple launches. I have a strategic choice to make, maybe I feel like robots today, maybe I feel like Kerbals. Who knows? Probably not even me until I give it a go. I want to go to Jool and don't really have the life-support tech for it. What the hell, let's go full Manley mode on it, I'll send a Kerbal to land on Lathe not because it's easy, but because it's mind-bendingly hard and once I've done it, I'm unlikely to ever do it that way again because it will be an exercise in pain. I want a colony that I can forget about: max out the appropriate part of the tech tree, unlock the 100% efficient closed-loop system and mostly forget about it like you do with enough solar panels. (Or toggle infinite life-support. Or install a mod. Although I respect not wanting to "cheat" or use mods, after all the reason I want life support in vanilla is to avoid needing mods for it. ) I hope this makes it clearer what life-support could add to the game and what it wouldn't break in the game.

There's a world of difference between adding different strategic choices during the design stage of building a rocket and micromanagement chores like twiddling your thumbs as you wait around in realtime or pressing a button every 5 minutes to tell your kerbals to eat (or every two seconds to breathe). Arguing that they're equivalent is a straw man argument. Adding another design constraint really is no different to fuel or power constraints, just with different parameters. I'm sure there'd be an "infinite life support" console flag like infinite fuel, or a mod for it. I don't care if you press that button, you have my permission for whatever it's worth. This isn't about realism, it's about the gameplay goal of making robotic exploration meaningfully different from kerballed. If meeting that goal happens to add an additional veneer of realism, that's great, but it's not the point.

I'm with regex on this one, life support is just another fuel/electricity type constraint. We already juggle those factors in our rocket designs, there's no overwhelming gameplay burden to adding a new one. It does however give an important trade off between kerballed and unkerballed exploration, just like RCS or SAS or any other module for that matter: you'll use it for the situations where it's advantageous, and won't use it in the situations where it's disadvantageous... and deciding what those situations are... well that's what a game is: a series of meaningful and interesting (and fun) decisions.

Tweakables are clearly not the final product, arguing about them isn't going anywhere. Like everything in KSP, a features gets added and then gets iterated on. This is very clearly just a first step. The reason you can't change the maximum values for fuel or types of fuel is because the system they have implemented only allows you to change the dynamic properties of objects: you can only make an object start in a state that it could otherwise have reached at some point later in the flight. Why do that? Because it's the implementation route that's least likely to introduce game-breaking bugs and lets you concentrate on making sure that you've implemented a sane UI, that you're saving the tweaked states correctly in the craft files, and that the tweaked state actually starts out on the launchpad correctly, that there's no crazy unexpected side effects like engines suddenly thinking they have no fuel or gear raise/lower toggles failing. Once they're satisfied that all that works without breaking things, or that they've fixed the things its broken, then they can move onto making the system more complicated. Like testing and building a rocket, sometimes you really really want to limit the number of things you change at one time, so you can have some clue about what change had what effect. This version of tweakables was fairly obviously the version that allows them to test the core concept of tweakables with the least number of changes.

Spaceport is giving a "Not allowed file type." error on trying to download it. Does it need to be a zip rather than rar? Edit: I got SO ninjaed dammit.

Yep, works.

If you're going to send one lab per biome, then yes, there's not much point in it. If you send a lab plus a lander to an environment with many biomes within easy reach, you don't just save yourself from sending two single-use experiments (for a net gain of one), you save yourself from sending two single-use experiments FOR EVERY BIOME (for a net gain of (2 * number of biomes) - 1). As more biomes get added to more bodies, this will become more and more useful.

Sorry for the necro, but for those, like me, who subscribed to this thread and missed it restarting: The Kethane Travelling Circus 2.

Science had me building things other than stations, but I returned to it soon enough: LKO Fueling Station Beta has its core modules assembled. Approach angles were sometimes "an issue" during construction: there's no RCS on the modules, to reduce part count once everything is in-place. Docking was a little snug while expanding... With habitation and escape modules and tugs... The more-usual solar panel configuration for easier docking and less lag. And UI so you can see the capacities. And finally, a shot down the length of the mast of the C3 module to show the cross section.

"Hellou it's Scott Manley here"??? How did I miss those being named. *rofl*

"Recombobulating discombobulator." Science has some real gems in there too. I love games that have some fun with the flavour text.

For me the Kerbals are clearly an evil race, caste-ridden yes, but ruled by a secretive elite with little concern for the majority of their race. Through a programme of propaganda and authoratarian control they keep the masses ignorant and in a child-like state of development, using random selection to choose a pool of candidates to send into space for unknown (and unknowable) purposes. Those poor candidates are kept sequestered from the rest of society in a coastal base, far from any other sign of civilization, their friends and families no-doubt held hostage against their good behaviour; and are sent on perilous ventures to orbit and beyond, with only the dubious nutritional value of snacks to keep their child-like minds quiet and occupied. They regularly deorbit spent nuclear engines into the sea, without care for the environmental damage or the possibility of fisherkerbals below the orbital path. Truly a heartless and despicable regime, and no surprise that duct-tape and parts found by the roadside are considered adequate safety measures.

I'm hoping that the science as implemented is a first-version placeholder and will be revised much like other aspects of the game have been revised as new patches come out, I think there's a lot of potential but it needs more depth and breadth, IMO I'd like to see these features: * A portion of science that can only be achieved by sample return to a lab. * Potentially some progression of science experiments in the tech tree to permit a greater portion of the science to be produced without sample return (the analysis we can do in 2013 on a rover on mars includes stuff we had to do in white coats on earth on returned moon rocks in previous decades...) * Experiments that take time to gather data, possibly from a pool that replenishes slowly (so you can't just send 4 probes and have them all gather it in parallel). * The ability to make a mobile lab that samples can be returned to for physical analysis, but not as effectively as a return to Kerbin. I'm loving 0.22 and the science, I'm hoping it's just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to what form it will eventually take, it has great potential.

Kaves & Krakens. Loving every aspect of this mission report, thank you.

My first space station, although technically nothing of the original survives via a process of replacement: Some of the superstructure I'd build differently with hindsight, there's definitely room for some economy on part numbers too, but as a working prototype it's done the job of proving most of the ideas I wanted to try out and to teach me ways to improve, so I count it a success. It's around 490 parts and 260t mass and so far has probably been 20-30 flights to assemble from very first hub (long since deorbited) to its current evolution.