Squadcast Summary for 2015-04-18 - Picture Perfect Edition!

[n.b.z.]

The larger MK3 sized intakes and wings are cool but... we don't have anything matching enginewise to go with them like a 2.5m RAPIER?

I initially thought the same. But now I'm thinking that I'm normally using several - sometimes lots! - of intakes for each engine.

In other words, I'm not too concerned that I still may need 6 or 8 jet engines for a larger plane, as long as I don't need 30 or 40 intakes for them!

The new intakes, wings and gear will already greatly reduce partcount on large winged vehicles.

On another note: For some time now, I've been trying to build a whole range of vehicles - a "colonization architecture". The first generation of it got thrown away unused because the partcount was too high. The second generation was about to be finished now, but I will probably throw it away because the new equipment bays will make much nicer vehicles possible.....

[Capt Snuggler]

Honestly, I expect most if not all parts to be changed in some way or another, given that there's a big rebalance as part of this update. Craft are gonna break, or at least have their capabilities changed.

This is the price of progress guys. Embrace it!

With all the cool new parts and the new aero system most current craft are going to die. Not much that can be done about it really.

[Majorjim!]

This is the price of progress guys. Embrace it!

With all the cool new parts and the new aero system most current craft are going to die. Not much that can be done about it really.

Agreed but Squad are well aware that we have been playing a long time and have many craft we spent a long time building and developing. It would be a common courtesy to show what parts will change so we don't lose hours of work. Makes sense no?

[Daze]

WOW that Xenon tank, finally now my Horizon II will fly at maybe at 20fps

[klgraham1013]

Agreed but Squad are well aware that we have been playing a long time and have many craft we spent a long time building and developing. It would be a common courtesy to show what parts will change so we don't lose hours of work. Makes sense no?

It's like, just maybe, you shouldn't do massive system overhauls right before release.

[Majorjim!]

It's like, just maybe, you shouldn't do massive system overhauls right before release.

Also agreed but there are many ships in mine and others saves that will be broken. Remember in the past squad saying there would be a grace period.?

That's what we need. So we can make changes instead of having broken craft.

[Red Iron Crown]

Agreed but Squad are well aware that we have been playing a long time and have many craft we spent a long time building and developing. It would be a common courtesy to show what parts will change so we don't lose hours of work. Makes sense no?

I understand where you're coming from, and I know you put a ton of work into your craft. Unfortunately, such a list would be provisional as things are obviously still changing (like the Round8 fuel type change and then revert just recently). Best to assume all parts are changing, and back up your 0.90 install so you can rework as necessary when the release is finalized.

[Yakuzi]

Wow great amount of info, so excited. First of all, thanks for listening to the community on the ROUND8 thing Squad*!

Now onto the Squadcast:

- Good to hear about the contract system adjustments. Also, an ability to propose your own contracts/missions when your rep is very high would really help out career

- The drill looks great, but does it always come in two or is there a single drill part as well?

- New intakes look great, looking forward to seeing sleek nosecones with similar aesthetics!

- The Mk3 wings look great as well, and they're wet wings! Are all wings in the game now moisturised?

- Loving the new 2.5m and 1.25m cargobays! Great job Roverdude!!!

- Ablative shielding looks good, but maybe play with the colour/contrast a bit more.

- I'll join the masses in expressing my concern with the fairings. On ejection they should split up in 2 (or more, make it an option) sections along the longitudinal axis, it makes no sense that they split up in multiple horizontal cross panels as shown in the image.

On the "no procedural wings" et al. comments:

<snip> I prefer having a list of parts and then putting stuff together. It's like a puzzle. And that's half the game, right there, too.

<snip> but there are mods you can use. This is actually an okay argument here because proc parts aren't really suited to the game's puzzle of building rockets.

I disagree, by your reasoning we wouldn't have stock proc fairings either. Procedural wings are by no means a single item that limit "lego-ness" in KSP, instead they allow for composite and creative design of winged craft without going into single digit FPS because of part-count (since part-count is still a thing). One of the main concerns with proc wings were that they would break off in large chunks, but now the same can be said for large Mk3 wings. Furthermore, with harv's recent explanation on the new fairing part-count:

There's only one part, which is the fairing as a whole. Fairing panels aren't independent parts, they're sub-objects of the fairing until you deploy them. A fairing that is 10 sections high and divided into 4 sides would have 40 panels, yes. How many objects this will produce on deployment depends on how they group together (that's next up on my to-do list actually).

As for how the broken-off bits behave after deployment, they are handled as solar panel pieces or engine fairings. They aren't fully persistent (which is good if you like 2 digit framerates). That doesn't mean they aren't solid objects, however. Point away from face.

This means that all proc parts can use this system right? So your proc wings could break into subparts without affecting the part-count. This is quite neat, if not in stock than definitely for the procedural wing mods out there.

*Please also listen to your community on the 1.0 release. We only have the best intentions and it's never too late!

Edited April 18, 2015 by Yakuzi

[Corw]

Agreed but Squad are well aware that we have been playing a long time and have many craft we spent a long time building and developing. It would be a common courtesy to show what parts will change so we don't lose hours of work. Makes sense no?

No, no it doesn't. It is still beta (even it is late beta) and you should expect thing to change. Old saves should not stop progress.

[Majorjim!]

No, no it doesn't. It is still beta (even it is late beta) and you should expect thing to change. Old saves should not stop progress.

I totally agree that old saves should not stop progress. I'm all for it. I just remember Squad themselves saying in the past there would be a grace period for the change in wing parts. If that grace period happened or not it shows Squad recognise and agree this is an issue.

I am not calling for a halt in progress at all. But as RIC said, its not really possible for Squad to say what will change or not.

[Corw]

I totally agree that old saves should not stop progress. I'm all for it. I just remember Squad themselves saying in the past there would be a grace period for the change in wing parts. If that grace period happened or not it shows Squad recognise and agree this is an issue.

I am not calling for a halt in progress at all. But as RIC said, its not really possible for Squad to say what will change or not.

It is clear they are in a hurry to make a 1.0 so from what I've seen all bets are off. Personally, I was always ready burn past work, so I have no issues here, but I can see how some people can. But again, I think it is a time to let go. It is not that important. We can rebuild it, we have the technology

[Majorjim!]

It is clear they are in a hurry to make a 1.0 so from what I've seen all bets are off. Personally, I was always ready burn past work, so I have no issues here, but I can see how some people can. But again, I think it is a time to let go. It is not that important. We can rebuild it, we have the technology

lol we do indeed. I both agree and disagree. Given that I have single craft that have literally taken months to make I feel quite strongly about it.

As you say I will endeavor to 'let it go'.

[Corw]

lol we do indeed. I both agree and disagree. Given that I have single craft that have literally taken months to make I feel quite strongly about it.

As you say I will endeavor to 'let it go'.

I would love to see screenshots of that

[r4pt0r]

Progress lads. as much as I am sure it pains many of you, compatibility between versions was never guaranteed. The blessing out of this, is that after 1.0(finished in they eyes of consumers), professional developers don't introduce updates that break saves. We can reasonably guess that saves should never get broken again.

[Superfluous J]

It will likely take more work to refurbish a 0.90 craft to work in 1.0 than it would take to rebuild the craft from scratch. Even once you get everything working from the perspective of the parts, there's still the changes to aerodynamics that will make flying or launching it completely different.

If the new aero even slightly resembles FAR, you will likely need far less dV to get into orbit (in exchange for not being able to launch things shaped like brick walls). And that's just a single example.

And, as others have said, there's nothing you can do for your ship NOW that you can't do in 9 days (assuming the countdown is correct). You should have a backup of your ship anyway, so just back up the entire instance of the game around it. If the ship is that important to you, then surely that one singular (and extremely simple) step is worth it?

[Majorjim!]

If the ship is that important to you, then surely that one singular (and extremely simple) step is worth it?

Hmm. Good point. I have two backups of the craft themselves so I will do this if changing them is too much work.

[smjjames]

I'm not sure if I remember correctly, but didn't Max (or someone) say something about the new physics bubble being increased by 10 times? Like 22 km is now 220 km? Or was he (or someone) referring to the difference between the current physics bubble and the new one?

Hmm. Good point. I have two backups of the craft themselves so I will do this if changing them is too much work.

Given that I use a lot of mods with parts, I'll start anew.

[Majorjim!]

I'm not sure if I remember correctly, but didn't Max (or someone) say something about the new physics bubble being increased by 10 times? Like 22 km is now 220 km? Or was he (or someone) referring to the difference between the current physics bubble and the new one?

Craft in orbit, atmosphere and on a suborbital trajectory will have an increased physics/draw bubble.

[smjjames]

Craft in orbit, atmosphere and on a suborbital trajectory will have an increased physics/draw bubble.

I know, but I thought someone said that the new increased physics/draw bubble was increased even further during the squadcast? It was while we were talking about the fairing pic.

They may have been referring to the difference between now and in 1.0.

[GoSlash27]

You know... I'm betting that we can find a way to make these fairings work properly. Maybe even clamshell.

KSP players are resourceful that way

Am I to take it that spaceplane parts will survive reentry by default? They'd kinda have to...

Best,

-Slashy

[Columbia]

Agreed but Squad are well aware that we have been playing a long time and have many craft we spent a long time building and developing. It would be a common courtesy to show what parts will change so we don't lose hours of work. Makes sense no?

Well, maybe someone could grab all the parts rendered obsolete, make it a modpack -and maybe- give people a chance to recompile all of their ships.

[Maddmatts]

Once again Max repeatedly, and frustratingly, reproduces the radial-decoupler bug and refuses to acknowledge that it's an issue.

It's been around for so long now that people have accepted it as a norm and complacently build around it. There was a time when radially detached parts wouldn't slam into the rest of the rocket.

[Majorjim!]

Once again Max repeatedly, and frustratingly, reproduces the radial-decoupler bug and refuses to acknowledge that it's an issue.

It's been around for so long now that people have accepted it as a norm and complacently build around it. There was a time when radially detached parts wouldn't slam into the rest of the rocket.

Really? He encounters the bug in the video? Did he just not mention it or actually said, "this isnt an issue"?

[smjjames]

Really? He encounters the bug in the video? Did he just not mention it or actually said, "this isnt an issue"?

From what I could tell, he was just being stubborn about it and not putting separatrons on there.

I'm hard of hearing, so I don't know what exactly he said.

I thought it wasn't a bug and had something to do with aerodynamics.

[Renegrade]

Yay! The Round8 is saved AND we have a new tank!

The little cargo bays are nice too (although I was hoping for a variety of sizes)...

I totally agree that old saves should not stop progress. I'm all for it. I just remember Squad themselves saying in the past there would be a grace period for the change in wing parts. If that grace period happened or not it shows Squad recognise and agree this is an issue.

I am not calling for a halt in progress at all. But as RIC said, its not really possible for Squad to say what will change or not.

You know you can have multiple installs of KSP, right? Even the Steam edition. Just copy and paste the folder and run it from it's new location. That way, your creations and mod-sets are safe from 1.0. And you can try out 1.0 without sacrificing 0.90 compatibility on your current saves. Also, the install not monitored by Steam won't accrue hours, so when you go into the library you won't realize you've wasted literally half of a year of solid time on KSP~

Once again Max repeatedly, and frustratingly, reproduces the radial-decoupler bug and refuses to acknowledge that it's an issue.

It's been around for so long now that people have accepted it as a norm and complacently build around it. There was a time when radially detached parts wouldn't slam into the rest of the rocket.

Glad to know the bugfixing is going well *cough*.