What do they mean by "Auxiliary Lab" ?

[Elway358]

So after needing to send up some more power supplies and fuel to my Mun Space Station due to underestimating usage, I figured I may as well accept the expand space station contract for it at the same time. I needed to add room for 13 kerbals and an "auxiliary  lab" as well as what was already on it to fulfill the contract.

Once I take control of the station, I have all requirements checked in green with the exception of that auxiliary lab addition. What the heck is an "auxiliary lab?" I have an existing mobile processing lab on it. Are they wanting me to add another one of those? I don't see anything anywhere in the tech tree called an auxiliary lab. Pic below shows the requirement page of the contract and one of my monstrosity of a station just because  Thanks for any help!

 

 

[Geschosskopf]

Hmm, interesting question.  I've never seen this contract parameter myself so I'm just guessing here.

1.  Do you have any mods that add parts?  Some of those include science labs of varying capabilities.  One of these might actually be called an "auxiliary lab".

2.  It could just mean to add a 2nd regular stock lab and the often opaque and confusing text of contracts calls it "auxiliary" instead of "a 2nd" or "another".

Those are the only possibilities I can think of.

[Snark]

I would say that they almost certainly want another MPL.  By "auxiliary," what they mean is "another one besides the one that you already have."

This is (IMHO) a systemic problem with the contract system:  all over the place, it uses chatty "descriptions" of things rather than saying exactly what the dickens they MEAN, as in the actual name of the part involved.

The only way to know for sure (other than just trying an MPL and seeing whether it works) is to crack open the contracts.cfg file in an editor, find the entry for that contract, and seeing what part it means.  But based on the language they're using, it's probably an MPL-- that's what they mean everywhere else they say "research lab".

BTW, I've opened a thread in the suggestions forum on "please say actual part names in contracts, not chatty descriptions"-- feel free to chime in there with this as an additional "pain point" example. 

@Arsonide, not sure if you're in any position to comment, but doesn't hurt to ask: is there any chance the game might address this issue at some point?

[Malich]

I've completed this with an extra lab a few times. Anything "Auxiliary" seams to mean fit an extra one of something you already had. I one had a station with not 1, not 2, but 3 cupola modules on it.

[Elway358]

Thanks guys. I guess I'm gonna launch another MPL up and hope that is what they're looking for.

@Geschosskopf I did actually download a few mods the other day to add some new parts and I'm glad you mention this because I just realized some stuff seems missing.

I downloaded KPBS and the USI kolonization packs but now that I'm looking, I don't see the little inflatable buildings that are supposed to be in the USI one, I see all the KPBS stuff but only a few things from the USI stuff.

 

[Geschosskopf]

1 hour ago, Elway358 said:

I downloaded KPBS and the USI kolonization packs but now that I'm looking, I don't see the little inflatable buildings that are supposed to be in the USI one, I see all the KPBS stuff but only a few things from the USI stuff.

Most USI mods have their own part tabs in the VAB instead of just dumping their parts into Utility or whatever.  With MKS and MKS-L, you should see another part type icon, kinda looks like a Kerbal with his arms raised, called "Kolonization".  That's where to find the base parts.  Very nice of @RoverDude to do that.  I wish more modders used this feature.

[Temstar]

Yes I can confirm auxiliary lab is just another MPL.

What I'm curious about is if you leave this extra MPL attached to the station what happens to the data? With one MPL you can already do the "get data out of experiment result" thing from any part that can hold experiment result. With two MPL which one of them actually get the data?

[FancyMouse]

I think the name is a little bit vague because it allows modded part to satisfy the requirement as well. It just so happened that only one stock part can do the job.

[Plusck]

You are asked to expand *thing in orbit* by adding an auxiliary lab. I think the assumption is that you know how many labs you already have on the station.

Although it could be clearer (especially for those non-English-speakers whose first language is not largely derived from Latin), I think I understand why they put it like that: the game knows how many labs (or whatever) there are on the station but there is no need to parse that number to create the contract text ("Add a second whatsit", "Add a third whatsit" etc.). Therefore "auxiliary" is most definitely the best term here.

As for "research lab" vs "science lab" vs "MPL" ... I can understand how that can cause confusion, but again the description for the MPL and the mechanics of doing research all point very clearly to it being a "research lab".

[Elway358]

Just a follow up to update that adding an additional Mobile Processing Lab did in fact fulfill the requirement for the contract. I had planned on just detaching after the contract completed but after thinking about it, I decided to just let it hang out on the station until I get brave enough to make a munar surface base and then toss it down there somehow.

I did try to use it for some additional processing of data but I can't seem to get it to cooperate. I've moved both scientists into it from the original one but still no deal. I have some experiments with about 175 data points to send over sitting in the little lander but my original one is sitting at 395/500 already so I'll just have to hold onto the data till the level goes down some I suppose.

I just stuck the new one on the end. Not too pretty but it worked  

[KerikBalm]

Its English:

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/auxiliary

Auxiliary

adjective

1.

additional; supplementary; reserve:

 

They want you to add an additional research lab to the station. My only problem with that, is that they should say processing lab, or they should rename the lab to be a mobile research lab instead of mobile processing lab.

[Elway358]

6 minutes ago, KerikBalm said:

Its English:

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/auxiliary

Auxiliary

adjective

1.

additional; supplementary; reserve:

 

They want you to add an additional research lab to the station. My only problem with that, is that they should say processing lab, or they should rename the lab to be a mobile research lab instead of mobile processing lab.

Exactly. The auxiliary part I could have been ok with (even though I still would have worded it as "additional" rather than auxiliary) but yeah, the way it's worded leaves one to believe that there is such a thing specifically named "auxiliary research lab." At any rate, problem solved.