Mathematical Laws of KSP (updated 7 July)

[Gaarst]

Added @mhoram's law and corollary

[RocketSquid]

Probability of giving up and going to eat cheese:

P_Cheese=t/x

Where t=mission elapsed time (real-world) and x is the number of unplanned explosions on the mission. Therefore, at 1 explosion per second, most reasonable people will view cheese as the better option. Note, however, that the above formula is simplified and does not account for the explosion hilarity constant (0.2) or the first law of unreasonability. Note as well that the above formula only applies when the alternative is cheese, as cake, pie, bacon, etc. have slightly different equations.
 

[Guest]

The Kraken Formula:

Please note that this was voided after the Great Kraken Die Off on Bop.

Where K = chance of a Kraken attack;

x = distance from KSC on the x axis in x meters;

y = distance from KSC on y axis in x meters;

z = distance from KSC on z axis in x meters.

Note that after 5000 Km, your chance of a Kraken attack will go over 100%, guaranteeing it.

Edited January 25, 2016 by Guest

[Rolacume]

10/10 would use laws again

 

[cubinator]

On 1/16/2016 at 9:02 AM, GoSlash27 said:

"The closer a Kerbal is to a hatch, the clumsier it gets".

I can relate to this...

[Gaarst]

Added @RocketSquid and @CliftonM's laws to the OP.

 

On 21/4/2016 at 9:17 PM, cubinator said:

I can relate to this...

And 1.1 has not improved anything (on the plus side, this means that Slashy's formula is still valid)...

[Gaarst]

Added the 22nd law, describing time dilation and physics lag near large vessel, that I wrote to the OP. Warning: it is very math-heavy !

[msasterisk]

Probability of a Hatch being Obstructed, also known as the Hatch Obstruction Theory:

P = E(tpI/3600h)

Where:

P is the probability of hatch obstruction.

E is a binary value (1 or 0) and is the answer to "Did you read the engineer's report?"

t is the real-life time spent on the mission.

p is the number of parts on the command pod.

I is the importance of the hatch.

h is the number of hatches on the ship.

If P comes out to be greater than one, a Kraken attack is inevitable before you can try to EVA.

[Hodari]

For every explosion, there is an equal and opposite revert/reload.

[nosirrbro]

The Law of CTD Exponentiality

c_p = s(l²)+r

 Where:

c_p is the probability of a CTD at some point during the current launch in a decimal percentage.

s is the stability, a value that cannot be directly measured but it can be found in approximate by working backwords. It is constant during a single game session, and cannot equal 0.

l is the number of launches in a given session.

r is the ram limit, and can equal either 0, when there is game usable ram available, or 1, when there is not.

 

Edited May 2, 2016 by nosirrbro

[Robotengineer]

FPS = 1/fps^nr

Where:

FPS = Resulting Frames Per Second 

fps = Your base, unmodded, frames per second

n = number of graphics mods installed

r = resolution of said graphics mods

"Your resulting FPS is the inverse related to your base FPS to the number of graphics mods times their resolution."

[superstrijder15]

On 15-10-2015 at 8:23 PM, Gaarst said:

14th Law: The memory problem (proposed by *Aqua*)
 

  Hide contents

P(M) = 1 - t_c / t_e

Where:

• P(M) is the probability an important part is missing
• t_c is the current mission time in seconds
• t_e is the estimated total mission time in seconds

On 15-10-2015 at 8:23 PM, Gaarst said:

Similarly to the Δv Problem, the theoretical and actual mission times are different, yet linked by the following formula:

T_a = T_e²

Where T_a is actual real life time to complete a mission and T_e is the estimated real life time to complete a mission.

Hereby follows that in missions of longer than ~root2 time-units, the change of forgetting the parachutes is infinite, as current elapsed time will at some point exceed the expected time, resulting in a negative probability, then someone will notice this and make probability a modulus(if negative number multiply by -1). at the end of the mission t_c/t_e will be 2, modulus 1-2=1 so 100% chance. 

[REMD]

Biome jump law

Δv1 + Δv2 x K + Δv3  > ReqΔv

 

Δv1         Δv needed for Biome jump

Δv2         Δv of Kerbal push on one EVA

Δv3         Δv neded to lift off

ReqΔv    Δv  needed to bring ship home

K            Number of EVA for pushing ... (= how much you want that sience from that biome)

[Gaarst]

Added @msasterisk, @Hodari, @nosirrbro, @Robotengineer and @REMD's laws to the OP, hope you'll enjoy them ! 

[Andem]

The Abandonment Problem:

Spoiler

Belovedness of Kerbal (B), divided by the Estimated Time Spent on Rescue (RT), plus the  the square root of the Funness (F) minus the difficulty of Recovery (R).

Or,

B/RT +√5-R

 

[Tig]

On 10/15/2015 at 2:23 PM, Gaarst said:

8th Law: On mission durations, the Crown law (proposed by Red Iron Crown)

Sidenote: You're not going to bed before 3am if you decide to go to Jool at 8pm.

 

 

This is NOT true!  Absolutely FALSE!  WHAT kind of....

Tig looks at his clock...

Aww, hell.   Stupid Laythe.

[Ozymandias_the_Goat]

Not boring at all. They all seem to ring with truth...

[Coga19000]

I ROFLed all the way through.

However, I proved your 3rd theorem wrong; it implies that a 1-part rocket's integrity should reach 0, and yet in practice its structural integrity approaches 1. Is there an axiom we should apply to prevent that inaccuracy from happening?

[Gaarst]

Added @Andem's law, as well as another one I wrote.

 

On 15/06/2016 at 0:22 PM, Coga19000 said:

I ROFLed all the way through.

However, I proved your 3rd theorem wrong; it implies that a 1-part rocket's integrity should reach 0, and yet in practice its structural integrity approaches 1. Is there an axiom we should apply to prevent that inaccuracy from happening?

The 3rd theorem only describes structural integrity. However structural integrity is calculated using essentially properties of the vessel's joints. A one part vessel is solely linked to air or the ground but you will notice that these links are extremely weak (a simple push is enough to move the part around), so technically speaking the structural integrity of the ensemble is nigh 0.
This case was accounted for when writing the theorem and was totally not thought of 5 mins ago 

[Arknid sine]

hay have you guys ever heard of the fuel paradox for rockets

if you haven here's a link to a very funny video bought it: 

 

[JKerman]

I know I shouldn’t be posting on a thread this old but...

I was able to rescue a Kerbal from the Kraken. That statement you made about the Kraken being inescapable is wrong. All you have to do is press R. If you’re lucky, it will trigger a reset of the Kerbal’s skeleton to perform the RCS animation, and the Kerbal will be fine. However, this technique rarely works in atmosphere, and only works about 30% of the time in vacuum.

[Gargamel]

Heh...  I remember reading this thread the first time around....   Good find necro'er!