Come hear about KSP 1.1, straight from Squad!

[passinglurker]

I think parts that use any local resource should all have to be purpose-built. Any places that share a resource, can obviously use the same technology. ISRU on the Mun would not be ISRU on Duna. The "one size fits all" approach just trivializes those parts, and turns them to magic.

For me thats a good sim but a poor excuse for a game perhaps isru could use a difficulty slider but that is a separate issue.

Either way a lot about kerbal is trivialized and abstract you can't simply hot swap the engine on a real rocket for example(congress had a hearing about this recently in fact) another example is how nuke engines should be running a low density fuel like hydrogen but they don't because they don't want to saddle the player with a lot of specialized fuel tanks, and then there's radiation... we just ignore that one... same applies here instead of giving specialized propulsion for every environment just give one and make the different environments to far apart and to different density/gravity wise make visiting them all with the same plane to impractical which in turn would give the crazy few who try a sense of accomplishment if they succeed.

[juanml82]

Jets would be powered by fuel of course. These silly electric prop ideas mean while would likely use fuel cells (more fuel!) At least that's what most of the prop mod users find they need to do. As for speed issues you either fly high to the elevation that equals kerbin pressure or you recognize it's still faster than roving

Yeah, but you still need to climb to those altitudes. Still, I may like electric propellers which, however, suck at low pressures.

Again you are all still hiding behind real world analogies about the composition of other world's atmospheres. I originally asked how this would break game balance not your suspension of disbelief

Well, it does break suspension of disbelief. Laythe kind of does already, but that can be accepted precisely to have a place where jet engines work outside Kerbin. Having every atmosphere have oxygen (which also means, life) pushes suspension of disbelief.

I think parts that use any local resource should all have to be purpose-built. Any places that share a resource, can obviously use the same technology. ISRU on the Mun would not be ISRU on Duna. The "one size fits all" approach just trivializes those parts, and turns them to magic.

In stock, ISRU is only for fuel and oxidizer (well, and monoprop, but that's another fuel). Water ice is water ice, be it in the Moon or in Mars.

And had Squad originally gone for fuel and oxidizer proportions resembling LH2/LOX, the whole ISRU thing could have been far more realistic. Basically, you mine ice instead of ore.

Coincidentally, that would also explain why air breather engines appear later than rockets than in the tech tree: they don't use kerosene (doesn't "Liquid fuel" resemble hydrazine, though?), but liquid hydrogen, which requires investment R&D instead of pulling the engines from the prequel "Kerbal Aeronautic Program"

[Red Iron Crown]

(doesn't "Liquid fuel" resemble hydrazine, though?)

Its closest real life analog is Aerozine 50, a 50/50 mix of hydrazine and UDMH. The densities and Isps are pretty close to real life for it, the big exceptions being the LV-N (Isp more like LH2) and jet engines (Isps more like kerosene). *shrug* It reasonable in the stock game to simplify the various fuels into just a few, IMO.

[tater]

My nukes already use hydrogen. That said, the gameplay issue is should you be able to make a craft that is 100% self-sufficient regardless of where it goes with just a few extra parts (drill, isru, ore tank, magic jet)?

To me that simplification removes problems that need to be solved, and to me that problem solving is the fun of designing systems that work (as opposed to a single craft that works).

[passinglurker]

Yeah, but you still need to climb to those altitudes. Still, I may like electric propellers which, however, suck at low pressures.

Well, it does break suspension of disbelief. Laythe kind of does already, but that can be accepted precisely to have a place where jet engines work outside Kerbin. Having every atmosphere have oxygen (which also means, life) pushes suspension of disbelief.

In stock, ISRU is only for fuel and oxidizer (well, and monoprop, but that's another fuel). Water ice is water ice, be it in the Moon or in Mars.

And had Squad originally gone for fuel and oxidizer proportions resembling LH2/LOX, the whole ISRU thing could have been far more realistic. Basically, you mine ice instead of ore.

Coincidentally, that would also explain why air breather engines appear later than rockets than in the tech tree: they don't use kerosene (doesn't "Liquid fuel" resemble hydrazine, though?), but liquid hydrogen, which requires investment R&D instead of pulling the engines from the prequel "Kerbal Aeronautic Program"

venus and mars atmospheres are mostly CO2. There are fuels that can burn CO2 as an oxidizer so nasa is researching the possibilities of jet engines and isru oxidizer extractors for exploring these planets so if we want to be sticklers about disbelief I'm afraid the idea is very real. in real life our limits are propellants and materials but those are abstracted in the game and therefore not an obstacle our limit to implementing crazy ideas in the game is instead how it fits into the gameplay hence why I've been asking how a jet working on duna or eve messes with the balance of the game.

My nukes already use hydrogen. That said, the gameplay issue is should you be able to make a craft that is 100% self-sufficient regardless of where it goes with just a few extra parts (drill, isru, ore tank, magic jet)?

To me that simplification removes problems that need to be solved, and to me that problem solving is the fun of designing systems that work (as opposed to a single craft that works).

I don't see how "unlock this specialized part to solve the artificial problem" is worth all the clutter and bloat there is no puzzle solving to it just grind science and click "OK". Meanwhile a common jet engine working on duna is no less of an engineering problem for the ksp player than a specialized jet engine working on duna and implementing the common jet engine is a more efficient use of development time and resources.

As for the gameplay issue admittedly you can already do this with magic rocket engines(super deep throttling, unlimited restarts, never fails, and I'm ok with all that) what makes this more OK than a solar electric prop is the needed parts are later in the tree and are much bigger and heavier complicating the launch.

[GoSlash27]

Sheesh, 5 pages and you folks are still arguing about this?? Squad isn't going to decide to implement this change based on who "wins" this argument, you know.

Best,

-Slashy

[Mister Dilsby]

How many times has the Mk1 cockpit been redone now? 3? And yet we're still using the same two capsules that we've had for at least two years?

And yet it's still the Mk1, not the Mk0.18 or 0.90 or even Mk1.0.4bis

[selfish_meme]

If they were to introduce propellers I would like to see balloons with them, thats the way to explore a non oxygen atmosphere.

I believe there is also work being done on a non oxygen breathing jet engine that uses magnesium powder. It tends to clog up though.

[Jouni]

I don't see how "unlock this specialized part to solve the artificial problem" is worth all the clutter and bloat there is no puzzle solving to it just grind science and click "OK". Meanwhile a common jet engine working on duna is no less of an engineering problem for the ksp player than a specialized jet engine working on duna and implementing the common jet engine is a more efficient use of development time and resources.

If the same jet engine worked on every planet with atmosphere, we could just reduce the clutter and bloat by removing the redundant planets.

Choosing the right engine for the task is the single most important part of KSP gameplay. Each engine has its own strengths and weaknesses, and the choice you make often affects everything else in the mission. For example, jet engines are small and powerful, but they only work in dense oxygen-rich atmospheres, and you have to carefully manage the flight profile to keep accelerating. Electric propellers would work anywhere, but if you wanted to use them on Duna, you would have to build a slow lightweight plane with huge wings. Nuclear ramjets would also work anywhere, but they would be too massive for Duna, and overheating would be a serious problem at high speeds.

[passinglurker]

If the same jet engine worked on every planet with atmosphere, we could just reduce the clutter and bloat by removing the redundant planets.

Choosing the right engine for the task is the single most important part of KSP gameplay. Each engine has its own strengths and weaknesses, and the choice you make often affects everything else in the mission. For example, jet engines are small and powerful, but they only work in dense oxygen-rich atmospheres, and you have to carefully manage the flight profile to keep accelerating. Electric propellers would work anywhere, but if you wanted to use them on Duna, you would have to build a slow lightweight plane with huge wings. Nuclear ramjets would also work anywhere, but they would be too massive for Duna, and overheating would be a serious problem at high speeds.

you make a good point but I don't find the analogy entirely fair most engine decisions in ksp are made based on the engines performance not arbitrary "they will or won't work here" decisions. we are getting enough jet engines now that they are differentiated to the point where say you'd rather take the basic jet to eve because it can produce thrust at sea level but you'd rather take the turbo-ramjet to duna because it's more suitable for the thinner atmosphere. Also an idea was kicked in earlier that the offworld performance be tied to relevant building upgrades meaning one would have a segment of play were duna and jets don't mix. all this gives the same level of design complexity a lot more efficiently than keeping jets the same and adding even more specialized propulsion.

[Nothalogh]

Holy mother of Droptanks!

That's the payload pod, no room for a bomb bay in that airframe

[panzer1b]

If the same jet engine worked on every planet with atmosphere, we could just reduce the clutter and bloat by removing the redundant planets.

Choosing the right engine for the task is the single most important part of KSP gameplay. Each engine has its own strengths and weaknesses, and the choice you make often affects everything else in the mission. For example, jet engines are small and powerful, but they only work in dense oxygen-rich atmospheres, and you have to carefully manage the flight profile to keep accelerating. Electric propellers would work anywhere, but if you wanted to use them on Duna, you would have to build a slow lightweight plane with huge wings. Nuclear ramjets would also work anywhere, but they would be too massive for Duna, and overheating would be a serious problem at high speeds.

Good point, but sadly it still seems that for almost anything that doesnt involve atmosphere (actually on duna its also the best engine), there is absolutely no reason to use anything but nukes. they have best range (even if you consider their mass on any craft but a super lightweight fuel tank+909+pod style build), they have enough thrust that you arent pulling your hair out or lagging to death (ions are so bad unless u have like 1 per ton, which adds up to incredible amount of part count, lag, and overall clutter. Maybee if they give us a 1.25m io engine with say ~10x thrust and 10X weight, then i might use that instead of the nuke, but for now its nuke all the way fo reverything but atmo (where u use jets anyways). The only planets where nukes wont cut it are tylo, eve, jool (actually im not sure its even possible to land on jool in the 1st place), kerbol, and kerbin, and laythe. Aside form that, basically anything can be landed on with nukes if you knwo how to do it right, and they are so much ebtter then LFOs.

I may be wrong on this, but according to experience and some calculations, the insane 800 ISP of nukes makes everything else completely redundant unless you want to do something on Eve, Kerbin, Laythe, Jool, Tylo, or Kerbol. Every other planet can be landed on with nukes, and well, if you are in space, then ur TWR isnt that important anyways. 2 of those planets btw support jets, so you get ultra ISP on kerbin/laythe (laythe is actually alot of fun, its atmo is thick enough to fly normally and land, but thin enough to be way less draggy and you can get near orbital speeds with pure jets.

Edited August 24, 2015 by panzer1b

[SciMan]

PassingLurker, I can think of a way to make every jet engine work on every planet, without breaking suspension of disbelief, AND without breaking game balance, AND without adding any parts.

It requires a few changes to the intakes, changes to the jet engines, and yes, an additional resource (because "duna air" isn't "kerbin air" even tho "it's just a game", because The Devs Said So).

Okay, so right now jets only work on kerbin and laythe, because that's the only places that have "oxygen" in their atmospheres (If it's not oxygen, it sure acts like it).

To make a jet engine work inside the atmosphere of any planet, you need a source of oxygen. We already have one of those, Oxidizer.

The intakes would be capable of supplying two different resources: "IntakeAir" (has oxygen), and the new "IntakeAtm" (No oxygen).

When you get the RAPIER unlocked, it allows you to make other jet engines work on planets that don't have oxygen in their atmospheres, by making them burn BOTH LiquidFuel and Oxidizer, in the standard 0.9/1.1 ratio that rocket engines use (no new tanks). They won't work without one of the two resources supplied by the intakes, so they still have a hard limit on how high they can go.

In other words, running a jet on Duna or Eve would require fuel, oxidizer, AND IntakeAtm. Essentially it would be an extremely efficient air-augmented rocket, except it wouldn't work without the "air" part, so it's still not "one engine for everything".

Can we stop that particular discussion now? I've read thru an entire 50-reply long page of it, and it gets tiring after the 5th post saying the same thing. Hopefully my idea is something you're all at least "okay" with.

On topic, it'd be nice if SQUAD found a way to add an "air-optional" mode to the RAPIER. It wouldn't shut off without intake air, but having intake air would boost the specific impulse proportionately to how much it can get. Of course, this effect would only boost the ISP to roughly 390 if activated at sea level with more intake air than it can possibly consume available, and would have a lower vacuum ISP than the pure closed-cycle mode if it can't get any intake air, would be subjected to the same spooling that regular jets have, and would run a bit fuel-rich compared to rocket mode (1.8 fuel / 1.1 oxidizer).

Basically an air-augmented rocket mode somewhere in-between the current air-breathing and closed-cycle modes. What can I say, I like air augmented rockets.

[passinglurker]

PassingLurker, I can think of a way to make every jet engine work on every planet, without breaking suspension of disbelief, AND without breaking game balance, AND without adding any parts.

It requires a few changes to the intakes, changes to the jet engines, and yes, an additional resource (because "duna air" isn't "kerbin air" even tho "it's just a game", because The Devs Said So).

Okay, so right now jets only work on kerbin and laythe, because that's the only places that have "oxygen" in their atmospheres (If it's not oxygen, it sure acts like it).

To make a jet engine work inside the atmosphere of any planet, you need a source of oxygen. We already have one of those, Oxidizer.

The intakes would be capable of supplying two different resources: "IntakeAir" (has oxygen), and the new "IntakeAtm" (No oxygen).

When you get the RAPIER unlocked, it allows you to make other jet engines work on planets that don't have oxygen in their atmospheres, by making them burn BOTH LiquidFuel and Oxidizer, in the standard 0.9/1.1 ratio that rocket engines use (no new tanks). They won't work without one of the two resources supplied by the intakes, so they still have a hard limit on how high they can go.

In other words, running a jet on Duna or Eve would require fuel, oxidizer, AND IntakeAtm. Essentially it would be an extremely efficient air-augmented rocket, except it wouldn't work without the "air" part, so it's still not "one engine for everything".

Can we stop that particular discussion now? I've read thru an entire 50-reply long page of it, and it gets tiring after the 5th post saying the same thing. Hopefully my idea is something you're all at least "okay" with.

On topic, it'd be nice if SQUAD found a way to add an "air-optional" mode to the RAPIER. It wouldn't shut off without intake air, but having intake air would boost the specific impulse proportionately to how much it can get. Of course, this effect would only boost the ISP to roughly 390 if activated at sea level with more intake air than it can possibly consume available, and would have a lower vacuum ISP than the pure closed-cycle mode if it can't get any intake air, would be subjected to the same spooling that regular jets have, and would run a bit fuel-rich compared to rocket mode (1.8 fuel / 1.1 oxidizer).

Basically an air-augmented rocket mode somewhere in-between the current air-breathing and closed-cycle modes. What can I say, I like air augmented rockets.

intake atm was always a hack by modders to get around squads botched job saying the intakes check for atmospheric oxidizer not the engines. rewrite things so that you can get intake air anywhere but the jet engines themselves check for oxygen and fail on planets without it, and it would admittedly solve a lot of problems, but it's a fix only squad can make. With that done we can have all the funky non-oxygen air breather technologies we want, but I'm afraid what you would find is that all those new funky parts would look and perform relatively the same as their jet counterparts because there are only so many performance niches in terms of gameplay stats and they would all have an intake and atmospheric nozzle.

[selfish_meme]

Good point, but sadly it still seems that for almost anything that doesnt involve atmosphere (actually on duna its also the best engine), there is absolutely no reason to use anything but nukes. they have best range (even if you consider their mass on any craft but a super lightweight fuel tank+909+pod style build), they have enough thrust that you arent pulling your hair out or lagging to death (ions are so bad unless u have like 1 per ton, which adds up to incredible amount of part count, lag, and overall clutter. Maybee if they give us a 1.25m io engine with say ~10x thrust and 10X weight, then i might use that instead of the nuke, but for now its nuke all the way fo reverything but atmo (where u use jets anyways). The only planets where nukes wont cut it are tylo, eve, jool (actually im not sure its even possible to land on jool in the 1st place), kerbol, and kerbin, and laythe. Aside form that, basically anything can be landed on with nukes if you knwo how to do it right, and they are so much ebtter then LFOs.

I may be wrong on this, but according to experience and some calculations, the insane 800 ISP of nukes makes everything else completely redundant unless you want to do something on Eve, Kerbin, Laythe, Jool, Tylo, or Kerbol. Every other planet can be landed on with nukes, and well, if you are in space, then ur TWR isnt that important anyways. 2 of those planets btw support jets, so you get ultra ISP on kerbin/laythe (laythe is actually alot of fun, its atmo is thick enough to fly normally and land, but thin enough to be way less draggy and you can get near orbital speeds with pure jets.

Try take a nuke to Tylo, we will wait here for you.

[Kuu Lightwing]

Try take a nuke to Tylo, we will wait here for you.

is it a challenge? Do I need to use NERVA for landing or I need to just land it there?

[Superfluous J]

is it a challenge? Do I need to use NERVA for landing or I need to just land it there?

It would make a decent challenge. As getting there is easy and landing one using regular engines is also (relatively) easy, the challenge would be to land on Tylo using ONLY Nukes.

I'm sure it's possible, but I really don't know if it's actually hard or not.

[Yukon0009]

It wleplex diould make a decent challenge. As getting there is easy and landing one using regular engines is also (relatively) easy, the challenge would be to land on Tylo using ONLY Nukes.

I'm sure it's possible, but I really don't know if it's actually hard or not.

Giggplex did it once, the trick is to make a light lander.

[Kuu Lightwing]

Hmm, I would probably need multiple NERVAs if I actually have to bring a kerbal with me and back... building a NERVA craft with 6,000m/s of dV is not hard, the problem is to deliver those 3,000m/s fast enough... And have Tylo TWR at least 1.5 at the landing...

I think I might try it...

[Superfluous J]

I just did a simple test, and landed on the first try.

On my side. But I didn't bring landing legs. The ship had enough dV to get back into orbit. So it's very possible, just takes a bit of care.

[Kuu Lightwing]

Well, you're probably more experienced than me. I only landed on Tylo once (with 300 ore from Eve, but that's another story) and craft wasn't designed to return (it was unmanned, so that's fine.)

[Sharpy]

Eh, if Tylo had flats like Minmus.... Land at nearly orbital speed, then brake.

[selfish_meme]

I just did a simple test, and landed on the first try.

On my side. But I didn't bring landing legs. The ship had enough dV to get back into orbit. So it's very possible, just takes a bit of care.

You should enter the T-prize did you take a capsule or lander can?

[Jouni]

you make a good point but I don't find the analogy entirely fair most engine decisions in ksp are made based on the engines performance not arbitrary "they will or won't work here" decisions.

Now this is confusing. I thought I was the one arguing from realism, while you were arguing from arbitrary gameplay considerations.

In theory, a jet engine burning magnesium with CO2 might be possible. There are still a million obstacles to overcome before we have a working engine, and it's entirely possible that the engine won't be practical. Even if we get a practical engine, its characteristics would be completely different from a jet engine burning kerosene with oxygen. Hence it makes no sense at all to use the same jet engines to simulate both in KSP.

A nuclear ramjet is a nuclear jet engine, so it would probably have a lower TWR than nuclear rocket engines. It's a ramjet engine, so its stationary TWR would be 0, and it would be useless at low subsonic speeds. It's an air-cooled nuclear reactor, so the airflow must be high enough or the reactor overheats. It can't go too fast either, or the airflow will heat the reactor instead of cooling it.

Also an idea was kicked in earlier that the offworld performance be tied to relevant building upgrades meaning one would have a segment of play were duna and jets don't mix.

This is an extremely bad idea. It's the equivalent of giving kerbals rings of ISP +10 (+20 when hovering). It utterly breaks the suspension of disbelief, making KSP just another bad game with a lot of bugs. It would make even less sense in the sandbox, which is the primary game mode for many of us.

Good point, but sadly it still seems that for almost anything that doesnt involve atmosphere (actually on duna its also the best engine), there is absolutely no reason to use anything but nukes.

If that's your experience, your missions are probably too similar to each other.

The shape of the nuclear engine is quite awkward, so you can't usually use just one of them, especially in landers. Most of the time, you need at least 6 tonnes of engine mass. If the payload is not large enough or the delta-v requirements are not high enough, there are usually better engines available. LF tanks are physically larger than LFO tanks with the same amount of propellant, making ships less maneuverable and landers less stable. Because other rocket engines use LFO, a mothership with nuclear engines can't support landers and other small ships from its fuel supply.

[Superfluous J]

You should enter the T-prize did you take a capsule or lander can?

Lander can. Just hyperedited the lander to a 100km orbit and did a normal landing. I've never even heard of the T-prize