Rocket vs Spaceplane poll

[regex]

2 hours ago, Gaarst said:

Playing mostly RSS here, so spaceplanes are not that much of an option.

Every time I see someone saying "spaceplanes are hard" I wonder if they've built an SSTO craft with 10km/s of delta-V that can take off and land from an Earth runway.

I banged together an "orange tank" orbiter for vanilla KSP in about an hour (probably less), they're pretty easy now that we have the Vector, and weren't too hard before then (just fiddley).  Vanilla-based spaceplanes take a bit more knowledge but they're really just about finding the right combination of engines and fuel (as opposed to struggling with lifting enough fuel to get you from ~mach 3 to orbit on rockets, for instance), which can take time.  Rockets in vanilla are pretty simple until you start considering payload, where "strut knowledge" really comes into play.  You could also go reusable which takes a decent amount of fiddling.  Basically once you know what you're doing vanilla KSP is pretty easy, really a matter of how much time you have to waste, and arguing about what aspects are "harder" for bragging rights is hilarious.

Edited February 4, 2016 by regex

[Workable Goblin]

2 hours ago, RizzoTheRat said:

Mechjeb's Smart ASS does a pretty good job IMO, set it to Surface mode and then have it hold a pitch, roll and heading.  Give it a bit of roll and heading to line up on the runway and then fly it on pitch setting, throttle and brake.  I can't get on with flying it on the keyboard and don't have a working joystick.

Ah, I was talking about MechJeb's Spaceplane Guidance autoland 'feature.' Does a great job of lining up, but it really, really, really wants to touch down at the runway threshold, which is no good. Especially because it thinks the runway threshold is underground due to KSC's facilities being elevated above ground level. Oh, and it will ignore terrain if it happens to get in the way of the glideslope. (It's very dangerous to use this 'feature' with the island runway)

Like I said, great at lining up, but requires a firm hand on the stick or it will crash straight into the ground.

[Lord Aurelius]

I like the idea of reusable spaceplanes and I think they look cool, but from a practicality standpoint rockets win for me every time simply due to the amount of real world time involved in spaceplanes. The cost benefit of having a reusable spaceplane is pretty much meaningless by the time I've actually unlocked the parts to build them (I'm usually drowning in funds at that point), but they take much longer to design and flying them to orbit takes significantly longer (and is more difficult and tedious for me), plus then you then have to fly them back and land them after delivering the payload. My time is valuable, and if I actually want to get a mission done, rockets are much more time efficient.

There are times, however, where I choose to make it my mission to build a spaceplane to fly a dummy payload into orbit for the satisfaction of building a functional spaceplane.

 

[A35K]

For me it depends on what the mission is. To bring heavy payloads to orbit, a rocket is definitely the way to go, as there's no way to fit some things in a plane's cargo bay. However, spaceplanes (once they're fully tested that is) tend to be much more reliable and safer than rockets (no complex staging, struts, etc.), so to bring crew and small satellites to orbit they are much better, especially as you don't jettison anything.

[Francois424]

As much as I like plane and making copies of shuttles, or making an X-15 that can get to space...
In the long run I prefer a 3-5min launch to a 9-15min one.  That is really the gist of it.

With re-entry heat of 1.0.x, I really miss an ablator underside that I would love to stick on my shuttles / planes.
Maybe in 1.2

[Vermil]

My feelings on this is mainly that a lot of people seem to enjoy spaceplanes, planes, helicopters, hydroplanes, submarines, trains, frigates,.. raving creativity. All the power to them.
I really hope KSP is going to continue to support things that makes this sort of general engineering possible. And expand on it. New wheel physics, for instance, is great news.

However, there is one thing that grudge me so ever slightly - doesn't affect my enjoyment at all, no, I embrace that too,..  - But, our rocket things are like 1950'ies, 1960'ies, while the spaceplane stuff is 2080,.. like.

I'm sure I'm going to immerse myself in spaceplanes one day, but so far I stick 100% to rockets, because it seems more 'honest' and, well, realistic.

 

Edited February 4, 2016 by Vermil

[Evanitis]

10 minutes ago, Vermil said:

I'm sure I'm going to immerse myself in spaceplanes one day, but so far I stick 100% to rockets, because it seems more 'honest' and, well, realistic.

An important point, yet to be noted in this thread. I have to admit that I logged many-many hours in KSP before I even touched a wing-part (if there were even wing-parts at that time). Visiting planets, building bases, playing around with mods... all by launching vertically. I'm pretty sure many other spaceplane-people share this notion.

I probably wouldn't even think about taking a plane to orbit, if I didn't visit most stock-planets before even finding this forum.

[GoSlash27]

I don't have a "favorite". I use rockets for some jobs and spaceplanes for others.

Best,
-Slashy

[luizopiloto]

anything with wings are easier to land close to KSC... so I usuallly use Spaceplanes like Shuttles or small winged ships for the missions arround LKO... I have an Skylon also...

[Madrias]

I like spaceplanes, personally.  Sure, it's hard to make it to orbit with 'em, but the ease of return is nice.  If you survive reentry, you get a choice on where to land, at least more so than "Pull the chutes and hope for the best."

 

But, while I voted for Spaceplanes, I must admit, one has to admire the brute-force of rockets for getting things into space.

[Majorjim!]

On 02/04/2016 at 6:35 PM, regex said:

Every time I see someone saying "spaceplanes are hard" I wonder if they've built an SSTO craft with 10km/s of delta-V that can take off and land from an Earth runway.

I banged together an "orange tank" orbiter for vanilla KSP in about an hour (probably less), they're pretty easy now that we have the Vector, and weren't too hard before then (just fiddley).  Vanilla-based spaceplanes take a bit more knowledge but they're really just about finding the right combination of engines and fuel (as opposed to struggling with lifting enough fuel to get you from ~mach 3 to orbit on rockets, for instance), which can take time.  Rockets in vanilla are pretty simple until you start considering payload, where "strut knowledge" really comes into play.  You could also go reusable which takes a decent amount of fiddling.  Basically once you know what you're doing vanilla KSP is pretty easy, really a matter of how much time you have to waste, and arguing about what aspects are "harder" for bragging rights is hilarious.

I could not agree more. The whole argument is ridiculous. Once you learn the basics of rockets and SSTOs in KSP the difficulty depends on the payload and the destination. In that regard rocket difficulty is massively more scalable than SSTOs. That scalability could also apply to SSTOs if you factor in distance. Due to rockets greater lifting capability, the payload complexity can be scaled higher than any SSTO ever could.

 The basics are the same for everyone. Once you have mastered those the difficulty is solely up to the builder. Some people choose to build simply, some are forced to by poor PC performance.

On 02/04/2016 at 9:58 PM, Vermil said:

My feelings on this is mainly that a lot of people seem to enjoy spaceplanes, planes, helicopters, hydroplanes, submarines, trains, frigates,.. raving creativity. All the power to them.
I really hope KSP is going to continue to support things that makes this sort of general engineering possible. And expand on it. New wheel physics, for instance, is great news.

However, there is one thing that grudge me so ever slightly - doesn't affect my enjoyment at all, no, I embrace that too,..  - But, our rocket things are like 1950'ies, 1960'ies, while the spaceplane stuff is 2080,.. like.

I'm sure I'm going to immerse myself in spaceplanes one day, but so far I stick 100% to rockets, because it seems more 'honest' and, well, realistic.

 

The current rocket parts are in line with current flight tech. The only reason SSTOs are so unrealistically powerful in KSP is the size of Kerbin. Nothing more.

[regex]

27 minutes ago, Majorjim said:

I could not agree more. The whole argument is ridiculous.

The poll is pretty cool, but watching the back-and-forth about how "hard" things are is pretty hilarious.

27 minutes ago, Majorjim said:

The current rocket parts are in line with current flight tech. The only reason SSTOs are so unrealistically powerful in KSP is the size of Kerbin. Nothing more.

Well ... The current rocket parts may be in line with 1960's ICBM tech, in general, but Kerbal material sciences are severely lacking in terms of mass reduction.   Of course, that probably has something to do with the size of Kerbin.

[moogoob]

Rocket. I've been playing around with VTHL shuttles quite a bit and find them enjoyable, but for sheer payload rockets are way easier.

[Green Baron]

Was glad to hear the rumour that rockets are eventually about to get an overhaul in some sort of 1.2, mods like KW in the past or now SpaceY (great work !) keep me coming back to KSP.

Concerning spaceplanes i totally agree with Lord Aurelius; in order to "get things done" i mess with rockets. Only sometimes i do sort of a spaceplane, but my vote is among the rockets.

I admit it's a beautiful sight to dock a spaceplane to a huge station, but lag ... f.r.a.m.e.r.a.t.e ...

 

[panzer1b]

Biased poll...

 

Where is the option for capital ships, given that thats 75% of what i build/fly, and those aint really spaceplanes nor rockets.

[Evanitis]

It's not about 'what I get to space', but '-how- I get to space'. The wording looks precise. Does your lifter have jet-engines and/or wings?

It also has an 'Indifferent' option.

Edited February 6, 2016 by Evanitis

[kotomikun]

On 2/4/2016 at 9:35 AM, regex said:

Basically once you know what you're doing vanilla KSP is pretty easy, really a matter of how much time you have to waste, and arguing about what aspects are "harder" for bragging rights is hilarious.

On the other hand... the thing that annoys me most about this community is that many of the skilled players scoff at anyone who finds some aspect of the game difficult (even though they themselves probably had the same difficulties, when they first tried it), seemingly trying to imply that people who have trouble with SSTOs, transfers, or whatever are stupid, lazy, or inexplicably lying about how hard it is. That's a form of bragging, too, y'know. Although this isn't a KSP problem so much as a general gaming problem. Hell, it's not even limited to gaming (I've had college professors who were like this about their subjects).

See, there's this persistent problem with being knowledgeable--it tends to make you forget what it's like to not be an expert, and makes it difficult to comprehend how any of this stuff could be hard for anyone. After all, it's easy for you; you already know most of the good techniques and all the mistakes you shouldn't make and you don't even have to think about it. But when you're inexperienced, well, mistakes are made. It can take a long time just to figure out what the mistakes are, let alone how to fix them.

SSTOs are especially counterintuitive because there aren't any real-life examples to work from. They're only possible because Kerbin is tiny, with an impossibly thick atmosphere, and simplified physics. KSP rockets work essentially like real ones--fly up, gravity turn, stage once or twice, orbit. If you do it wrong there's a lot of room for error. For an SSTO you first have to design a stable-flying aircraft, then fly it to orbit with less room for error and experimentation and far less real-life logic. I just saw a challenge entry where a giant ore tanker accelerated to at least 1 km/s a few meters over the ocean and plowed its way into space. I mean, yeah, it works, but it's absurd; what newbie would think of trying that? The few SSTOs I've made use a more sane strategy of just flying up and switching to rocket thrust at high altitude, but this apparently doesn't work very well (took a lot of fiddling to barely make orbit, and I'm probably not flying efficiently).

Rockets can be hard, too, and require new strategies, if you make them ridiculously huge or weird-shaped. But that's not how people conceptualize it. Rockets and SSTOs are usually seen as two very different things. A simple rocket is relatively easy, and a simple SSTO is relatively hard... for most people. For some it may be the opposite, because not everyone thinks the same way. Some people do things a certain way specifically because it's harder. Variety is a good thing, though, I think.

[regex]

29 minutes ago, kotomikun said:

On the other hand... the thing that annoys me most about this community is that many of the skilled players scoff at anyone who finds some aspect of the game difficult

I don't think I've ever seen a skilled player scoff at a new player for saying something is difficult, at least not on these forums. 

What I have seen is encouragement to practice and gain knowledge so that the new player can also appreciate that KSP is really about what you know and how you apply it, not about one thing being "harder" than another.

Maybe I just interpret what I read differently...

[delta144]

On 2/4/2016 at 0:41 PM, swjr-swis said:

Rockets to go to space, planes to stay atmospheric (*), rovers for surface, boats/subs for sea... there's a pattern in there somewhere.

Crew transfers between surface and local orbits are pretty much the only exception. Other than that, my payloads into space are often heavy and bulky and unfit for cargo bays, which quickly rules out spaceplanes as a viable launch method.

The other reason: why send it up in multiple cargo-bay-sized pieces and repeatedly do the rendevouz-and-assemble dance in space, if I can send it up in a fraction of the time in one huge fiery blaze of liquid testosterone, and be starting the transfer burn before the spaceplane would've even made it back to KSC to refuel and pick up the second piece?

(*: 'plane' in my case has a very loose definition. Sometimes they may actually look more like a rocket. Or something out of a movie. Or ... an open-wing Model F308 concert grand piano. I mean, just saying, my atmospheric crafts don't necessarily have traditional looks. )

Because on career it is cheaper to recover a plane. Although, I still use rockets since I can bung on a cheap autopilot and chutes for the first stage recovery.

I still think it would be better if you have done an orbit with X rocket/plane with a dock around kerbin then there should be a building that you can put in scientist/engineers to plot flight paths etc for that rocket. the more scientist etc the faster the plots, launch, and docking occur making resupplies such a tedious task. in the resupply building just select what docking port on the rocket, then select the docking port on the object in space and the rest is done by the team. levels of scientist/engineers in the team could represent efficiency?

[swjr-swis]

7 hours ago, delta144 said:

I still think it would be better if you have done an orbit with X rocket/plane with a dock around kerbin then there should be a building that you can put in scientist/engineers to plot flight paths etc for that rocket. the more scientist etc the faster the plots, launch, and docking occur making resupplies such a tedious task. in the resupply building just select what docking port on the rocket, then select the docking port on the object in space and the rest is done by the team. levels of scientist/engineers in the team could represent efficiency?

Routine Mission Manager gets close to what you describe, with some limitations and no official version beyond 1.0.4 yet.

[moogoob]

On 2016-02-04 at 0:55 PM, Workable Goblin said:

Ah, I was talking about MechJeb's Spaceplane Guidance autoland 'feature.' Does a great job of lining up, but it really, really, really wants to touch down at the runway threshold, which is no good. Especially because it thinks the runway threshold is underground due to KSC's facilities being elevated above ground level. Oh, and it will ignore terrain if it happens to get in the way of the glideslope. (It's very dangerous to use this 'feature' with the island runway)

Like I said, great at lining up, but requires a firm hand on the stick or it will crash straight into the ground.

I've never been either a) brave enough or b) confident enough in Mechjeb's guidance to even try clicking on that option. Heck, I don't trust it fully to land on the mun (it once landed Bob 12km away from his target due to a sloppy plane change burn) and I use Mechjeb all the time.

Edited February 8, 2016 by moogoob
Missed a parenthesis.

[gilflo]

With the spaceplane, every ton you launch to orbit can land at Space Center, except fuel, and be re used.

There's some interesting mods with ramjet engines that allow to send 5 orange tanks in orbit, and other mods that allow mining and self refueling.

So with the exception of Duna, where landing is like rolling dice even with a good autopilot, and Eve where you need non atmospheric (oxygen) and very powerful engines, you can almost go every where with a spaceplane.

Since the 1.0 version and the heating problem on re-entry I have only been on spaceplanes and i know how to deal with re-entry.

I am on a project for Eve and my problem is that I do know nothing about atmospheric entry and heating problem on a big rocket assembly landing to Eve.....

 

[Red Iron Crown]

Rockets. They take me more places, and fit oddly shaped payloads better. I make planes and hybrids but it's really rare to leave Kerbin's SoI with them (and rarer still to come back).

[ThaZeus]

On 2/4/2016 at 9:41 PM, swjr-swis said:

 in one huge fiery blaze of liquid testeroserone 

Thus is the kerbal way...

[MarvinKitFox]

Spaceplanes are sexy.

That is their biggest, first, and ONLY merit.