totm may 2024 [1.12.x] - Modular Kolonization System (MKS)

[Kobymaru]

29 minutes ago, voicey99 said:

Are you saying it makes the whole thing physicsless?

I believe that in a sense, it does.

29 minutes ago, voicey99 said:

Does it do aero forces as well, or just mass?

That I don't know, sorry. But testing that should be pretty easy

[Terwin]

17 hours ago, Kobymaru said:

And another reason is to enable truly permanent settlement.

If your hab time if 50+ years, then timers stop and it is listed as 'indefinite' for all kerbals at that base.  At that point I think the only benefit of using colony supplies in hab modules is to let you use Kerbal Reproduction. 

 

15 hours ago, Virulent said:

Bug Report: MKS Ranger hab module will not deploy - even though I have ample EC and MKs available. 

It says that I need 8000 mks and 500 EC - even though I have near double the MKS available to me on my ship, and 10k EC. I don't understand why it says this but it does. Saving and reloading doesn't work. 

While it's possible it's a conflict with another mod - I sort of doubt it. I have deployed an identical configuration just last night. The hab is attached to the scout landing platform radially - no clue why it's not pulling resources from the rest of the craft. They are all attached nothing should be amiss. 

 

Edit: Figured out the problem, I suppose. Local warehouse wasn't checked, which is odd that it threw back that problem, because the ship was all connected up anyhow. 

Except it is the EVA'd kerbal that needs the material kits, not the craft, so if they do not have access to the kits(local resources), they cannot expand the module. 

 

1 hour ago, voicey99 said:

Are you saying it makes the whole thing physicsless? Does it do aero forces as well, or just mass?

For specific child parts(mostly collapsed ranger modules, I think) the mass gets moved to the parent with 'mass transfer' enabled, but I am pretty sure that aerodynamics are not ignored for those parts.

I believe that there is a specific attribute that indicates if a part can be affected by Mass Transfer on it's parent, meaning that it will mostly affect USI parts.

[Wyzard]

26 minutes ago, Terwin said:

I believe that there is a specific attribute that indicates if a part can be affected by Mass Transfer on it's parent, meaning that it will mostly affect USI parts.

Yes, it's ModuleWeightDistributableCargo.  Several MKS and Kontainers parts have it (such as most or all of the Ranger modules), and MKS includes an MM patch that adds it to the KIS storage box too.

[DStaal]

8 hours ago, Aelfhe1m said:

As I understand it, the logistics model works on a sort of batched process. Grab some input resources into local storage, process them and store outputs into local storage, next batch push excess outputs to planetary logistics if connected.

While the base is focused these batches can be quite small so only a little storage is needed but if you leave the base unfocused to go do something else for a while then catch-up comes into play. When you return to a base a cycle of 6 hour batches is run to catch up on work that would have been done while it was unfocused. So for best results you probably want a bit more than 6 hours worth of directly attached storage for each input and output resource.

Thinking it runs on a batched process is somewhat misleading - though technically it might be accurate.  What it doesn't do is run on an *independent* process.

Like most things in KSP, I believe it runs once per physics tick.

One of the main properties of KSP is that physics ticks can represent various amounts of in-game time.  At standard, they're basically once every frame of the game, in realtime - but you start using the timewarp and they get further apart.  The game doesn't try to do a continuous simulation of everything - what it does is record all forces and processes occurring on each part, assume those are static for a moment, and then calculate the result at the end of the moment.  Each moment is one physics tick.

So, to speed up time in the game it makes those 'moments' longer - and conversely if you have enough going on in your game you can actually have a 'moment' take longer in real time than it does in game time, at which point the game slows down.  But the advantage of this system is that every 'moment' (or tick) will take nearly identical time - regardless of how long the moment was.  The length of time they take to calculate is dependent on the complexity of the ship and it's environment, not how long the time period that passed was.  (And note at higher time warp levels KSP actually simplifies by making some more assumptions.)

When arriving at a ship you haven't seen for a while, KSP uses this to catch-up: It runs the time warp on that ship at the maximum speed until it catches up with the present.  That speed happens to be one tick is six hours.

All logistics does is go 'every tick, check to see if we need to either pull or push resources, and do that'.  If the tick is 1/60 of a second, it deals with the resource change after 1/60 of a second.  If it's 6 hours, it deals with the resource change after six hours.

[Aelfhe1m]

2 hours ago, DStaal said:

Thinking it runs on a batched process is somewhat misleading - though technically it might be accurate.  What it doesn't do is run on an *independent* process.

Like most things in KSP, I believe it runs once per physics tick.

[snip]

All logistics does is go 'every tick, check to see if we need to either pull or push resources, and do that'.  If the tick is 1/60 of a second, it deals with the resource change after 1/60 of a second.  If it's 6 hours, it deals with the resource change after six hours.

Thanks @DStaal that's a much clearer way of stating what I was stumbling about trying to explain.

[Alshain]

6 hours ago, Kobymaru said:

Draws machinery from the nearest machinery container that has local logistics enabled. If there is none, does nothing.

Ok... but why?

[Kobymaru]

1 minute ago, Alshain said:

Ok... but why?

Because (almost?) all converters consume machinery to emulate "wear and tear". Maintenance fixes this "wear and tear" by restocking the machinery back to full.

[Alshain]

Just now, Kobymaru said:

Because (almost?) all converters consume machinery to emulate "wear and tear". Maintenance fixes this "wear and tear" by restocking the machinery back to full.

Oh, so it's just a faster way of transfer then?  Basically the same as alt-right click?

10 hours ago, voicey99 said:

Take 12h of storage if you're using PL as kontainers only empty down to half full when pushing.

What is the formula for calculating that?  I have no idea what 12h of storage is.

[Kobymaru]

8 minutes ago, Alshain said:

Oh, so it's just a faster way of transfer then?  Basically the same as alt-right click?

If you have one vessel with machinery attached, then yes. But if you have multiple vessels, you would have to ship around machinery to all of them, which would be rather tedious considering machinery is excluded from local logistics.

This way, you can walk around and "perform maintenance" on every part and it just draws from the nearest container that you have selected for it. Better yet, putting an engineer in a Workshop triggers "automatic maintenance" of all modules upon load.

[Alshain]

Just now, Kobymaru said:

If you have one vessel with machinery attached, then yes. But if you have multiple vessels, you would have to ship around machinery to all of them, which would be rather tedious considering machinery is excluded from local logistics.

This way, you can walk around and "perform maintenance" on every part and it just draws from the nearest container that you have selected for it. Better yet, putting an engineer in a Workshop triggers "automatic maintenance" of all modules upon load.

Oh! Ok, now that makes sense.  I didn't realize machinery couldn't use LL.

When you say "Workshop", are you talking about the "[Workshop]" configuration or just the modules?  I was wondering what that mode did, as well as some of the other bracketed functions ([Smelter], [Crusher] for example.)

[Nergal8617]

2 minutes ago, Kobymaru said:

This way, you can walk around and "perform maintenance" on every part and it just draws from the nearest container that you have selected for it. Better yet, putting an engineer in a Workshop triggers "automatic maintenance" of all modules upon load.

Automatic maintenance will also refuel nuclear reactors if you have extra fuel on hand, very useful.

[DStaal]

15 minutes ago, Nergal8617 said:

Automatic maintenance will also refuel nuclear reactors if you have extra fuel on hand, very useful.

And regular maintenance as well.

[DStaal]

51 minutes ago, Alshain said:

Oh! Ok, now that makes sense.  I didn't realize machinery couldn't use LL.

When you say "Workshop", are you talking about the "[Workshop]" configuration or just the modules?  I was wondering what that mode did, as well as some of the other bracketed functions ([Smelter], [Crusher] for example.)

I believe you just need to be in the modules.

As for the bracketed functions: When in those modes, the module doesn't do that itself, but it makes any *other* nearby module that's in the corresponding un-bracketed mode more efficient.  So if you put it in [Smelter] mode, nearby Smelters will produce more.

They're helper modes.

[voicey99]

4 hours ago, Alshain said:

What is the formula for calculating that?  I have no idea what 12h of storage is.

The formula is basic maths. Prod per s*60*60*12=storage needed.

[Alshain]

1 minute ago, voicey99 said:

The formula is basic maths. Prod per s*60*60*12=storage needed.

I don't think that is right.  There are a lot more variables than that.  They were just talking about [Workshops] making things more efficient.  For drills, the percentage resource in the area has to be there somewhere.

[voicey99]

14 minutes ago, Alshain said:

I don't think that is right.  There are a lot more variables than that.  They were just talking about [Workshops] making things more efficient.  For drills, the percentage resource in the area has to be there somewhere.

Use the MKS Explainer mod to display true per-part production and the vanilla resource panel for net resource gain or usage/s.

[Alshain]

Lol, frankly I don't think it should be necessary to have a mod to explain your mod to you.

[voicey99]

7 minutes ago, Alshain said:

Lol, frankly I don't think it should be necessary to have a mod to explain your mod to you.

It isn't, assuming you have a scientific calculator on hand. It's MKS, it's complex-that mod just makes it easier to understand.

Edited July 13, 2017 by voicey99

[Alshain]

Just now, voicey99 said:

You don't, assuming you have a scientific calculator on hand. It's MKS, it's complex-that mod just makes it easier to understand.

But, that's why I was asking for the formula... I have a TI-83 sitting right next to me.

[voicey99]

1 minute ago, Alshain said:

But, that's why I was asking for the formula... I have a TI-83 sitting right next to me.

Why not use the stock resource panel? It tells you your net balance per s, so if you have a net gain of 0.7/s (disp. as -0.7), you need a minimum of 0.7*60*60*12=30,240 units of space. There's no complex formula involved outside of individual production but the panel collates it all for you, rendering chalkboard-filling maths unnecessary.

[Alshain]

12 minutes ago, voicey99 said:

Why not use the stock resource panel? It tells you your net balance per s, so if you have a net gain of 0.7/s (disp. as -0.7), you need a minimum of 0.7*60*60*12=30,240 units of space. There's no complex formula involved outside of individual production but the panel collates it all for you, rendering chalkboard-filling maths unnecessary.

It's inconsistent.  It jumps all over the place before I can even read it.  It also doesn't help me prior to deploying my drill.  You don't see it till it's too late.

Edited July 13, 2017 by Alshain

[voicey99]

56 minutes ago, Alshain said:

It's inconsistent.  It jumps all over the place before I can even read it.

Then that means your production or consumption is jumping around as well, and your equations will add up to a different total every time. If you insist on production formulas, here they are. Multiply the end result by their VAB-stated values to get /s rates for cnsmptn/prod. These are what I remember, I'm away until sat so they may not be correct.

DRILLS [0.05 + 0.2 * (lvl of most skilled miner/engineer on board + 1)] * [local resource abundance] * [thermal multiplier] * [geology rating as a decimal squared] * [num bays set to resource].

CONVERTERS [0.05 + 0.2 * (lvl of most skilled technician/engineer on board + 1)] * [machinery level as a proportion of full] * [thermal multiplier] * [governor] * [efficiency part bonus¤] * [geology rating a a decimal squared¤¤] * [num bays set to resource].

¤Explained here.

¤¤Supplies or Organics production uses [geo rating * botany rating] instead

Edited July 13, 2017 by voicey99

[Kyle Worden]

Sorry to interrupt the conversation about conversion rates, I've been going through the documentation and reading as much as I can about the processes, functions, and roles of MKS. What things did you learn by experience? Any mechanic that you found that wasn't explained in great detail? Any tips that you would give to someone else in this mod?

 

And is plopping down a mock-up base on kerbin a good test environment to see if I am forgetting anything important? The only thing that wouldn't be replicated that I can think of is the level of homesickness.

[DStaal]

23 minutes ago, Kyle Worden said:

Sorry to interrupt the conversation about conversion rates, I've been going through the documentation and reading as much as I can about the processes, functions, and roles of MKS. What things did you learn by experience? Any mechanic that you found that wasn't explained in great detail? Any tips that you would give to someone else in this mod?

 

And is plopping down a mock-up base on kerbin a good test environment to see if I am forgetting anything important? The only thing that wouldn't be replicated that I can think of is the level of homesickness.

Plopping a mock-up on Kerbin is a great idea, I think.  There are actually two mechanics that won't be replicated: Homesickness, and Kolonization.  (Well, Supplies will be only partly replicated: you won't have penalities.)  The latter will increase your production over time, but can be ignored starting out.

[Satanoid]

Hi guys, first post here. I need some help, I can't find what I'm doing wrong with Planetary Logistics. I'm using KSP 1.3 and MKS 0.52.1 and can't pull resources from planetary logistics.

Here is my setup:

I can't pull for instance Fertilizer to the Kontainer Tank or the 'Ranger' Inflatable Storage. As you can see in the right there is a Logistics Center and one of those Kerbals is a Pilot. Also I can't pull for intance the oxidizer and so-on.
I made another vessel for the pushed the resources.

Can anyone see what am I doing wrong?

Thanks in advance.