Fuel improvments. More advanced fuel transfer/management(VAB/SPH and during missions)

[Arugela]

We need the ability to use the "Resources" window or equivalent to fuel and fill vehicles both during missions and in the VAB/SPH.

On mission it should allow you to encapsulate vehicles whole resources and use the Super+rightclick trick to transfer fuel to the entire ship as opposed to a single fuel tank and fill them evenly while seperateing two or more connected vehicles. This could possibly be done by separating all vehicles separated via docks and or claws as other vehicles. Then you can allow a super Plus right click type of option between two vehicles and then tranfser fuel between them as whole objects and fill the fuel evenly as it would when burning it to refill all parts of the ship. This would help all complex vehicles and allow refueling where otherwise it may be hard or impossible to find individual tanks. Things in CArgo bays could or should be allowed to transfer fuel through the main ship from another vehicle(through the fuel lines)potentially and be able to be fuel separately from the main ship so you do not have to haul full vehicles etc.

In the VAB/SPH it should add a resource window and allow you to select either a single resource and slide it like how an individual tank allows so you can play with the weight of the vehicle. This should also have an option to do this with all/multiple resources simultaneously so you can play with various weight distribution setups and more accurately simulate fuel use in flight!

[KrazyKrl]

Just off the top of my head:

Something like an advanced vehicle properties window. (Parts explorer?)

• This window would consist of a hierarchical tree starting with the root part, and containing all sub-parts. (Maybe something like windows explorer folder GUI.)
  
• Multi-selection with shift/ctrl/checkboxes.
  
• This feature would essentially be a copy off of manually selecting parts in the flight scene.
  
• The bottom half of this window could be a grouping system where you can add parts to each "bucket".
  
• "Buckets" of parts can be renamed.
  
• You may replace/merge into a bucket with tree/bucket/flight-scene selected parts.
  
• You may "view" the bucket of parts in the main hierarchical tree (replaces any current selection.)
  
• Using some GUI button in this advanced vehicle properties window would open, essentially, a singular condensed tooltip containing all settable features for selected parts.

Other than an absolute mess of parts, like a large portion of your entire craft; this would be a nifty feature. Needing to abuse camera mechanics to select parts that may be in a fairing or whatnot is a hinky workaround. The GUI needs some love, and as a bonus; you could use those part buckets to make easier use of action groups too.

[Arugela]

They could put some of it in the actual computers in the cockpit too. I've always wondered why they haven't been used more. They could have an advanced computer system that can only be fully used from IVA. That could make a great internal computer system for all ships. They could make several versions of it too and add a new tech tree to unlock with computer system OSes to unlock etc!

But if they do the thing with the resource window and seperate vehicles it takes care of a swathe of stuff for stacked parts with a simplified version when using Normal 3rd person mode. The rest would be great in the Internal Interface in the ship. I still swore it had that when I first started playing. But it never seemed to get more advanced or I'm remembering another game. I can't really play my current ship with high enough graphics to see. That or they tend to be unmanned and don't have a cockpit! 8)

Edit: Another cool thing might be the ability to make ISRU's only fill up another vehicle or specific tank. A big OS could do alot of that. And making some of that only in the cockpit could give a cool way to make IVA useful. Especially as it could be more convenient to simply go IVA and make a zoom in of the computer screen and use it to go over everything in the ship.

Edited November 2, 2015 by Arugela

[fireblade274]

I have made multiple threads about better fuel control specifically being able to add fuel tank "tick boxes" to the action groups, so you can activate/deactivate more then one tank at a time. Anything bringing about better fuel management I will welcome with open arms

[Arugela]

Another good idea might be buttons and controls to auto adjust all of your fuel in your ship automatically to various presets. Then you just have to wait for the tanks to finish the pumping. Maybe Forward/Back/middle/Balance(to balance based on how they currently pull.) or whatever else would make sense. How would they work in real life or what types of things do you do with fuel when you design something in real life?

[fireblade274]

At the very least being able to transfer fuel from multiple tanks at once would be nice

[Rath]

you can; option click on each tank.

[Arugela]

Yea, but in some, more complex vehicles you can't easily click on tanks. Hence why putting a computer like this in an IVA only location, preferably unloading lag, could be a nice way to make IVA useful. Particularly with cockpit already existing onboard display screen and computer.

The rest helps in third person or in the vehicle creation process in the VAB/SPH. It could really help a lot of people.