Ascent paths, gravity turns, SRBs

[Snark]

12 minutes ago, Pecan said:

Pods used to face East (ie; hatch on the West) in the VAB and North, as now, on the pad, with the camera as now - East in VAB, North on pad.  Since that meant the rocket turned 90-degrees between building and launching it the arrangement was changed so the orientation is the same in the VAB as on the pad.

Yeah, I remember when they made the change.  I'm glad that they made the two consistent, but IMHO they changed the wrong one-- should have adjusted the pad position to match the VAB's, not the other way around.

13 minutes ago, Pecan said:

I don't expect much effort to be put into it again because it's nothing to do with Kerbal Flight Simulator, so all the 'plane fliers aren't impacted by it.

Yah, I hear that, brother.    So much attention given to spaceplanes for so long, so little to rockets.

<keeping fingers crossed for 1.2>

I assume Squad has their reasons.  For one thing, much as it pains me (as a dyed-in-the-wool rocket guy who never uses spaceplanes) to admit this, it may just be a matter of catering to the player base.  I have no idea how the spaceplane-versus-rocket popularity numbers break down, but I bet Squad does; perhaps spaceplanes are where the demand is.  I also can't help noticing that it seems like the majority of questions asked in this forum these days are about spaceplanes, though whether that's because they're more popular, or just more confusing (and therefore more question-prone), I dunno.

[OhioBob]

2 hours ago, Snark said:

1. the default initial camera view on the launch pad is facing east, not north

The problem with this is that the rocket is pitching away from the camera view, causing the player to lose his visual cues as to the rocket's angle of tilt.  It's much easier to eyeball it and quickly estimate the angle of tilt with a side view.  With an eastward view I'd mostly lose this ability and would be forced to fly almost entirely by the NavBall.  I wouldn't like this.  Even though I do rely heavily on the NavBall, I prefer the visual of a side (northward) view.  I think that most people's brain can make more sense of it that way.

Also, to me, it is mostly irrelevant whether I'm pitching or yawing.  When I'm looking at my rocket on the launch pad while facing north, I know I want to tilt to the right for an eastward launch.  To do this I want to press the right control key. i.e. "D".  It just seem very counter intuitive to me that you would want to press the top key, i.e. "W", to tilt right.  This is why I suggest that players not rotate the pod/probe core.  However, if it works for you, then it's not up to me to say you're doing wrong.  Each player has to figure out for themselves what they prefer.

 

Edited December 27, 2015 by OhioBob

[fourfa]

Is there a mod or config edit to have pods default to facing east in the VAB?  That orientation (and pressing W to pitch on launch) are far more logical to me.

[Pecan]

2 hours ago, Snark said:

Yeah, I remember when they made the change.  I'm glad that they made the two consistent, but IMHO they changed the wrong one-- should have adjusted the pad position to match the VAB's, not the other way around.

Yah, I hear that, brother.    So much attention given to spaceplanes for so long, so little to rockets.

<keeping fingers crossed for 1.2>

I assume Squad has their reasons.  For one thing, much as it pains me (as a dyed-in-the-wool rocket guy who never uses spaceplanes) to admit this, it may just be a matter of catering to the player base.  I have no idea how the spaceplane-versus-rocket popularity numbers break down, but I bet Squad does; perhaps spaceplanes are where the demand is.  I also can't help noticing that it seems like the majority of questions asked in this forum these days are about spaceplanes, though whether that's because they're more popular, or just more confusing (and therefore more question-prone), I dunno.

Yep to all this, although we wander off-topic again.  FWIW I really do think Squad are meeting demand very well.  Seems a lot of people say "Oooh, space", "Spaceplanes are cool". "I wanna be cool, make it easier to make cool spaceplanes".  You will notice I rarely address spaceplane questions, which is because they aren't interesting.

[GoSlash27]

I'm pretty sure the focus on spaceplanes is for a much more mundane reason; PorkJet's stuff is 1) free and 2) easy to incorporate. And PorkJet is a spaceplane guy. If we had somebody donating rocket parts of the same caliber, I'm pretty sure we'd have more rocket content.

 I'm a spaceplane guy myself, and I have to admit that spaceplanes and aviation in general have only marginal utility at best in a stock career. This is a game balance issue that probably needs to be addressed at some point. We have a vast selection of airplane parts, but no practical reason to make airplanes. The paltry amount of science available in far- flung biomes simply doesn't justify the time and effort required to collect it. 

Best,

-Slashy

[Wanderfound]

On 26 December 2015 at 2:31 AM, CosmicCharlie said:

If I increase my AoA past the default 5% (to 8%) my SRBs crash into my ship when I jettison them.  How are you people making gravity turns that start under 10km and shallower ascent paths without shedding your SRBs first?

Gravity tuns are gradual. Pitch over 5-10° as soon as you leave the pad, then follow the prograde marker the rest of the way. If your ship is built right and your nose is on the prograde marker, booster separation goes smoothly:

 

But if you keep having trouble, well, that's what Sepratrons are for:

[Temstar]

I'm with @Snark, I consider any rocket that has the navball lined up so pitch down is North to be a travesty. First thing I always do when selecting a root part is to hit the Q button.

I do have the rocket on screen when I launch because rocket exhaust is pretty. But you could just as well give me a navball that took up the entire screen and I'll fly to space just the same.

[OhioBob]

13 hours ago, Temstar said:

I'm with @Snark, I consider any rocket that has the navball lined up so pitch down is North to be a travesty. First thing I always do when selecting a root part is to hit the Q button.

I do have the rocket on screen when I launch because rocket exhaust is pretty. But you could just as well give me a navball that took up the entire screen and I'll fly to space just the same.

I think it's pretty arbitrary how one defines the pitch and yaw axes.  For launch, I just redefine them so that, in my mind, the A-D keys control pitch and the W-S keys control yaw.

I could also launch entirely by instruments if I wanted to, but staring at a NavBall is boring.  I'd rather enjoy the animation.

 

Edited December 28, 2015 by OhioBob

[Snark]

2 hours ago, Temstar said:

I'm with @Snark, I consider any rocket that has the navball lined up so pitch down is North to be a travesty. First thing I always do when selecting a root part is to hit the Q button.

I do have the rocket on screen when I launch because rocket exhaust is pretty. But you could just as well give me a navball that took up the entire screen and I'll fly to space just the same.

I wouldn't call it a "travesty," but I certainly would like an east-facing rocket better.

However, @OhioBob makes some excellent points about the default camera angle-- the real issue here is that different players relate to the game in very different ways.  For example, Bob's point about the camera angle wouldn't have occurred to me, because I keep all my mental orientation by way of the navball and just use the main view as "eye candy."

So I don't think there's a best answer here, at least not for everyone.  However, it sure would be nice if we could have our cake and eat it, too-- for example, I would love for there to be a game setting from the main menu, "Default ship orientation in VAB" with options for "North" or "East".  (With "North" being the current behavior, and "East" being the way I play.)  That way each player can set it up how they like.  Just add the option, and make "North" the default setting, and everybody's happy.

In the meantime, maybe I should go write a mod to do just that, so that any "easterners" can have it how they like it. 

 

[mrclucks]

I used to use MJs accent guidance back in .90 where aerodynamics didn't exist, however since 1.0 the atmosphere was remodeled and aerodynamics actually played a part in launching rockets.  My general rule of launching since 1.0 and has been proven right since then is to get a twr of about 1.4, thrust straight up till you reach a bit over 50m/s around 700m and then fly prograde(I use MJs ASS, but make sure its on surface prograde and not orbital or it'll end badly) at the same time turning over about 10 degrees to the right.  When done correctly your craft will turn back practically straight up and you should see the prograde vector hit 5degrees around 1500m and ten at 3000m.  It will then continue and you'll reach 15km when around 45 degrees.  I then switch to follow prograde vector between 25km and 30km( where the atmosphere won't have much of a grip on your craft) and ride it out to 100km to circulize at my favorite parking orbit.  

It takes only a few launchs to get comfortable with that sort of launch and probably isn't the most efficient way, but its fairly good and isn't that difficult to pick up.  It's always OK to to make slight adjustments to your launch profile mid launch as long as you keep your craft relatively stable( I always launch with the aerodynamics debug window, f12, for that reason).  

[Reactordrone]

On 27/12/2015 at 7:43 AM, OhioBob said:

Also, to me, it is mostly irrelevant whether I'm pitching or yawing.  When I'm looking at my rocket on the launch pad while facing north, I know I want to tilt to the right for an eastward launch.  To do this I want to press the right control key. i.e. "D".  It just seem very counter intuitive to me that you would want to press the top key, i.e. "W", to tilt right.  This is why I suggest that players not rotate the pod/probe core.  However, if it works for you, then it's not up to me to say you're doing wrong.  Each player has to figure out for themselves what they prefer.

 

The default setup also makes the WASD keys aligned like compass points, W-S being north-south and A-D being west-east. Makes sense to push up for north, down for south and right for east, left for west.