Is the Orbiting 101 tutorial not firing on all thrusters?

[pendant]

Hi

Kernoob here; have been playing the tutorials.

In the Orbiting 101 tutorial, I thought I'd try my hand at some manoeuvering; translate up/down, left/right, forward/back. They all seem to work fine... all but translate forward, that is. For some reason that doesn't seem to work. When I press 'Left Shift' or 'H', the gauge indicates that I should be moving, but I see no puffs from the ship, and... the monopropellant usage reads '0.00' (for all other translate operations, this usage varies between 0.33 and... 0.83, I think it is). I get the same result whether I'm in 'LIN' or 'ROT'.

Does the ship in this tutorial have a busted thruster?

... or is there a bug in the software?

... or is it just me?

Thanks for your help!

Edited May 19, 2015 by pendant

[RocketPropelledGiraffe]

I'm not at home right now so I cannot check the tutorial craft atm, but judging from the images I think you only have RCS thrusters pointing to the sides, none to front or back. There are four "place anywhere" thrusters at the back monoprop-tank and additional ones at the capsule, they only point and thrust to the sideways directions. That would be consistent with your experience that you can translate in any direction, but not to front or back.

[Chaos_Klaus]

Well ... there is no thrusters firing at all. I had that before. F5 then hold F9 solved it for me.

The gauges only indicate a control input. It doesn't mean you are actually moving.

[RocketPropelledGiraffe]

Well, why should there be a thruster firing if none is pointing in the desired direction?

[Chaos_Klaus]

Ok ... I was confused ... I thought this was the docking tutorial.

In that case it is perfectly normal. You simply do not have any RCS thrusters on your vessel that fire prograde or retrograde.

[pendant]

Well ... there is no thrusters firing at all. I had that before. F5 then hold F9 solved it for me.

The gauges only indicate a control input. It doesn't mean you are actually moving.

I only included images that show the problem situation. I can see thrusters firing when I translate in all directions except for forward.

Thanks for the confirmation that the gauges only indicate a control input.

I'm not at home right now so I cannot check the tutorial craft atm, but judging from the images I think you only have RCS thrusters pointing to the sides, none to front or back. There are four "place anywhere" thrusters at the back monoprop-tank and additional ones at the capsule, they only point and thrust to the sideways directions. That would be consistent with your experience that you can translate in any direction, but not to front or back.

(my bold)

The point is that I can translate back (as I said); but I cannot translate forward.

[Harry Rhodan]

but I cannot translate forward.

Because there are no RCS thrusters pointing backwards.

[RocketPropelledGiraffe]

The point is that I can translate back (as I said); but I cannot translate forward.

Watch your thrusters closely when translating backwards: The thrusters on the capsule are pointing partially to the front, since the capsule is conical. you should get a little bit of backwards thrust from them, and those should be the onse firing when you try to maneuver in that direction.

Your craft does not have any thrusters to move you to the front, that's why nothing at all happens when you try to go in that direction.

[pendant]

Watch your thrusters closely when translating backwards: The thrusters on the capsule are pointing partially to the front, since the capsule is conical. you should get a little bit of backwards thrust from them, and those should be the onse firing when you try to maneuver in that direction.

Your craft does not have any thrusters to move you to the front, that's why nothing at all happens when you try to go in that direction.

OK, I think I see what you guys are trying to tell me Thanks for your help!

So, my next question is: is this behaviour by design? Is this just how a bog-standard capsule/ service module combination works? (If so, I'm puzzled why -- but it would perhaps explain why I stayed up all night one night last week trying to do the Docking training mission; I simply could not get those capsules aligned... and if it's because that ship also has no forward translation, that might explain it!)

My next question (my last, I promise) is: Is this behaviour appropriate in a tutorial intended for use by complete kernoobs like me? -- I grant you, what I was doing was beyond the scope of the tutorial itself -- Gene Kerman had left me long before. But I knew that Orbiting 101 would put me straight into space so I could experiment with the controls (you know, without all that tedious stuff beforehand mucking about building rockets and launching them*). And I think what this kernoob might do, others might, too. Surely it would be kinder to add back-facing thrusters so folk like me could translate forward, and not get confused?

* Incidentally, I did go back to Flight Basics to see if the capsule/ service module on top of that launch assembly was any different -- and I found it is. No thrusters at all on that one!

Edited May 19, 2015 by pendant
minor typo

[RocketPropelledGiraffe]

Frankly, as far as tutorials go the KSP ones are pretty mediocre... They got better for 1.0.

Granted, orbital mechanics is not a simple thing and spacecraft are necessarily complex, that's why scripted tutorials are really difficult to set up.

That's why getting started is so much easier with some videos.

But you make a good point actually, for the tutorial craft design it would propably be a more sensible design to either not include any RCS thrusters at all or to place the 4-way thrusting RCS systems - would have spared some confusion here.

[stibbons]

So, my next question is: is this behaviour by design? Is this just how a bog-standard capsule/ service module combination works?

The behaviour of the Orbiting 101 vessel is by design - it's designed for orbital maneuvres, not fine adjustments. I was slightly surprised that it had any RCS capability at all until I played through the scenario. It tries to teach the player about rotation and using SAS, and rotational RCS is a reasonable idea for that.

Whether that's all you want your service module to behave is left as an exercise for the reader.

(If so, I'm puzzled why -- but it would perhaps explain why I stayed up all night one night last week trying to do the Docking training mission; I simply could not get those capsules aligned... and if it's because that ship also has no forward translation, that might explain it!)

Nope. The Docking tutorial craft is entirely different, and does have 4-way RCS nozzles around the centre of mass. It's entirely capable of translating and rotating in any direction. The reason you were up all night trying to get it there is that docking is REALLY HARD, and the vast majority of players here had just as much trouble as you the first time they tried it (my own first docking took all night and several quick-loads to recover from vessels slamming in to one another...). Don't worry, it gets easier with practice.

Is this behaviour appropriate in a tutorial intended for use by complete kernoobs like me?

Honestly, my first reaction is that all of the tutorial descriptions are pretty clear cut in what they cover - from those alone I'd have a fair idea of what is and is not in scope for each, and would figure out pretty quickly if I'm trying to do something that the current tutorial doesn't want me messing with yet. And after you've played through them all it's pretty clear that the vessels in each have been limited with that goal in mind. Of course, hindsight is 20/20, and I guess I can see how it would be fairly easy to charge in and miss the cues.

[pendant]

[...]

Nope. The Docking tutorial craft is entirely different, and does have 4-way RCS nozzles around the centre of mass. It's entirely capable of translating and rotating in any direction. The reason you were up all night trying to get it there is that docking is REALLY HARD, and the vast majority of players here had just as much trouble as you the first time they tried it (my own first docking took all night and several quick-loads to recover from vessels slamming in to one another...). Don't worry, it gets easier with practice.

Heh... I should perhaps have mentioned that I did finally manage to get them docked. Of course I should have taken a breather there, but, instead, all excited at having succeeded, I ploughed on... patted myself on the back when I figured out that I didn't have to squeeze them all into the one capsule because -- there was a lifeboat pod! Plotted an orbit back home... and, just as we were, all six, approaching atmosphere, I suddenly thought "Oh, bugger -- is there a heatshield on this lifeboat thing?" In retrospect, the answer to that must have been 'yes', but with Kerbin looming large in the window, I decided that saving three would be better than possibly losing six, so I (shades of the opening scene of Pitch Black) -- hit the space bar and ditched the lifeboat

Object lesson, learnt: know your vehicle

Honestly, my first reaction is that all of the tutorial descriptions are pretty clear cut in what they cover - from those alone I'd have a fair idea of what is and is not in scope for each, and would figure out pretty quickly if I'm trying to do something that the current tutorial doesn't want me messing with yet. And after you've played through them all it's pretty clear that the vessels in each have been limited with that goal in mind. Of course, hindsight is 20/20, and I guess I can see how it would be fairly easy to charge in and miss the cues.

You're absolutely right, it's too much to expect a tutorial to cater for every crazy thing every idiot like me is likely to try

Thanks for taking the time to set me straight!