How do I save Jeb from malf save file?

[MarvinKitFox]

New-ish game, 1.0.5.  Mods alarmclock, KER. Nothing that should change gameplay.

 

Jeb is piloting a very basic airplane, that is taxiing around the KSC base.

 

Problem is, it allowed me to quicksave while still on the ground, and rolling at some 35m/s (well below flying speed). As I then exited the game to try figure it out, his death is saved in persistent.

When this save is loaded, the whole plane instantaneously explodes! Log says multiple collisions with terrain. Visual shown plane falling *below* surface by about 2m, then shredding.

 

Looking at the .sfs file, it shows state as "flying". Ok, so thats why it allowed the save. But on load, he falls through the ground before the wheels realize that they should support the plane's weight.

How do I fix this?

Preferably without editing the save file, but that will do in a pinch.

How do I avoid it in the first place? Didn't the game use to refuse a save while on the ground, or with collision very imminent?

[FancyMouse]

My suggestion is to remove the craft completely and restore Jeb's state. Another option is to EVA immediately upon load and hope he survives.

And yes game is supposed to disallow saving when taxiing (even like 1m/s), but it allows saving in flight. You're seeing it's flying so KSP actually thinks it has taken off, which should be the reason you see everything else. No idea why it becomes flying, though.

[Snark]

Yes, it's vexing.  You're right, the game is supposed to stop you from saving in that case, but it can be a bit wonky if you're a borderline case, for example if your 35 m/s plane was right at the edge of taking off.

I've run into this myself when doing long-distance rover exploration on places like Minmus.  Rovers are so prone to getting damaged (in particular, popping their wheels), and long-distance travel takes such a huge amount of time, that it's really necessary to do frequent saves to protect against the rover going kablooie.  But slowing to a dead halt so I can save is really tedious, so I just figured, okay, this is Minmus, the rover frequently goes flying for short distances whenever it goes over a bump, I'll just hit F5 when I'm "airborne" and then it's good, right?

Well, yes... except that I discovered to my sorrow that it's dangerous.  Sometimes it works.  Other times, when I try to restore such a save, it takes me right back to my "airborne" rover, but instead of just landing on the terrain and continuing, it falls through the terrain until it's completely submerged underground, and then explodes.

Moral of the story:  The game will sometimes let you save when you're on (or in close proximity to) the ground, and moving over it.  Don't do this.  Sorry, wish I had a better answer for you.

At this point, I'd say your best bet would be to edit the save file in some fashion.  Perhaps the simplest thing to do would be to just edit the ship's altitude so that it's, say, 5000m above the ground.  Then you can just recover and land.

Another possibility that might work (it depends how fast it explodes after restoring):  try turning on the "hack gravity" cheat first, then restoring the save?  Not sure if that option maintains its turned-on state while restoring a save, but if it does, maybe the lack of gravity will allow the 35 m/s plane to take off rather than collding into terrain.  Something to look at, anyway.

[Waxing_Kibbous]

Be very careful with editing the save file if you go that route- back it up somewhere safe, because even seemingly minor changes can nuke your game. I would say don't do it, and if Jeb is simply "MIA" (depends on game settings) he will be back in the lineup in a few days anyway, although missing any experience gained.