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

[WuphonsReach]

On the kolonist note, I would prefer to see the kerbals hired through the planetary UI have random attributes again (stupidity, courage).  And for those attributes to have at least some effect on their performance (+/- 30% for stupidity?).  Courageous kerbals might be more willing to be cooped up in tight spaces, for instance.  Maybe up to 2x longer then their more fearful companions, and the most fearful kerbals might take a 25% hit to their hab/home rating.

[jd284]

  On 1/28/2017 at 7:02 PM, TauPhraim said:

But I just sent such an unmanned vessel to another planet, and apparently that one does not push its stuff (actually that planet does not appear at all in the logistics panel). The other planet do not have any other vessel landed, contrary to the original moon. Is it supposed to be this way, or should I hunt for a bug ?

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You probably need a pilot there first to set up the planetary logistics in the first place. It may be sufficient to get one in orbit.

Not sure if this is completely intended but it kind of makes sense to me.

  On 1/28/2017 at 8:01 PM, WuphonsReach said:

On the kolonist note, I would prefer to see the kerbals hired through the planetary UI have random attributes again (stupidity, courage).

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Really? Who would hire people without checking their skill level first... a large part of the hiring process is to find the stupid people and then not hire them.

I could see that working for the "random kerbal" option where you just need a warm body though.

In any case Roverdude has expressed his dislike for using these attributes in game mechanics. The only place where they really matter currently is EL if you enable the "stupid = low productivity" setting.

[zabieru]

 

  On 1/28/2017 at 9:17 PM, jd284 said:

You probably need a pilot there first to set up the planetary logistics in the first place. It may be sufficient to get one in orbit.

Not sure if this is completely intended but it kind of makes sense to me.

Really? Who would hire people without checking their skill level first... a large part of the hiring process is to find the stupid people and then not hire them.

I could see that working for the "random kerbal" option where you just need a warm body though.

In any case Roverdude has expressed his dislike for using these attributes in game mechanics. The only place where they really matter currently is EL if you enable the "stupid = low productivity" setting.

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I suppose it depends on whether a full Stupidity bar means "dumb as a box full of rocks" or "at the lower end of the astronaut corps," i.e. still pretty damn smart (by kerbal standards, anyhow). Given the Courage apparently runs from "brave enough to ride a kerbal-built rocket into space" to "brave enough to enjoy same," it'd make sense if full-stupidity was actually pretty sharp.

[WuphonsReach]

I suppose some of that depends on whether RoverDude can get the Astronaut Complex working, or at least make it far cheaper to hire kerbals via that route (where you can see what you're getting ahead of time) instead of having to do all the hiring through the Kolonization Dashboard UI.

But yes, I'd like a bit of randomness with effects like sending a stupid kerbal out to do dissassembly would result in a lower return on Material Kits.  Which makes it more important to groom and vet your kerbals.

And maybe time spent in the Training Academy could be used to smarten up those at the lower end of the stupidity scale.

[RoverDude]

Short version as I am on mobile.  I have no intention of using the stupidity and courage attributes as it would overcomplicate things unnecessarily, hence why I dropped using them in 0.50.0

[gamerscircle]

In regards to the Sky Crane - I think I found a small issue?

I had the small Guidance Unit , skycrane, Rockomax X200-8 Fuel Tank , MKS Tundra MultiHub and a 2.5 cradle.

With no clipping, it would seem that even though there is thrust [because the cradle would start to heat up] , there is not really any thrust aka the craft wasn't changing position at all.

When I rotated the skycrane 15 degrees, it then worked.

I am not sure if this is a known issue, but it took me and my stream' chat to figure it out in about 45mins.

[TauPhraim]

  On 1/28/2017 at 11:02 PM, gamerscircle said:

When I rotated the skycrane 15 degrees, it then worked.

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In my experience, the skycrane is very easily obstructed, if you've got anything slightly wider, even at big distances downstream of the plume.

[gamerscircle]

  On 1/28/2017 at 11:17 PM, TauPhraim said:

In my experience, the skycrane is very easily obstructed, if you've got anything slightly wider, even at big distances downstream of the plume.

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That is what I was thinking, I was attempting to make a compact skycrane package and I really really like the new cradles.

[Wyzard]

  On 1/28/2017 at 11:02 PM, gamerscircle said:

Wth no clipping, it would seem that even though there is thrust [because the cradle would start to heat up] , there is not really any thrust aka the craft wasn't changing position at all.

When I rotated the skycrane 15 degrees, it then worked.

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Were the skycrane's engines pointing at part of the cradle? If so, you won't get any thrust, since your craft is pushing against another part of itself, instead of against the ground.

I've had that happen with a rotated skycrane's engines pointing at the extended legs of a Scout lander module. Took awhile to figure out why it wasn't slowing down for my landing.

[DStaal]

  On 1/28/2017 at 7:02 PM, TauPhraim said:

On a moon of the home planet, I have bases all over the place, including some distant unmanned drillers, that do push resources to planetary logistics thanks to Duna Pioneer modules.

But I just sent such an unmanned vessel to another planet, and apparently that one does not push its stuff (actually that planet does not appear at all in the logistics panel). The other planet do not have any other vessel landed, contrary to the original moon. Is it supposed to be this way, or should I hunt for a bug ?

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Planetary logistics requires that you be landed to push/pull.  (In fact, all of the current logistics mechanisms require that you be landed.)

[Gilph]

  On 1/27/2017 at 9:48 PM, sh1pman said:

By the way, the 5x multiplier is currently broken and doesnt affect anything. There is a github issue for that. So you probably don't want to use the "hab-common" option on it, until it's fixed.

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Hi, just checked both my stations and the 5x hab common multiplier is working fine. Wanted to let you know.

[TauPhraim]

  On 1/29/2017 at 3:20 AM, DStaal said:

Planetary logistics requires that you be landed to push/pull.  (In fact, all of the current logistics mechanisms require that you be landed.)

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The vessel is landed (it is even drilling/converting).

[DStaal]

  On 1/29/2017 at 6:10 AM, TauPhraim said:

The vessel is landed (it is even drilling/converting).

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Sorry if I miss-read.

Then it sounds like it should be working.  The question starts to be on details at that point: Do you have warehousing enabled (where relevant), are you more than 50% full, etc.  I don't believe you need a pilot to 'set up', though I haven't tested yet with the latest version.

[TauPhraim]

  On 1/29/2017 at 6:15 AM, DStaal said:

Sorry if I miss-read.

Then it sounds like it should be working.  The question starts to be on details at that point: Do you have warehousing enabled (where relevant), are you more than 50% full, etc.  I don't believe you need a pilot to 'set up', though I haven't tested yet with the latest version.

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Ah sorry, my bad: I confused (again) the Duna Pioneer with the Duna LogCenter when I built that second ship ... Everything should be fine once I fix that hopefully.

[sh1pman]

  On 1/29/2017 at 4:54 AM, Gilph said:

Hi, just checked both my stations and the 5x hab common multiplier is working fine. Wanted to let you know.

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It just adds some Kerbal months because of its crew capacity, while the 5x multiplier isn't applied. You can compare the hab time that's calculated in VAB to the actual hab time you get when you assemble the base, it's much lower than it should be.

It's been reproduced, so it's definitely a real issue: https://github.com/BobPalmer/MKS/issues/1110

[damerell]

  On 1/28/2017 at 9:33 PM, zabieru said:

I suppose it depends on whether a full Stupidity bar means "dumb as a box full of rocks" or "at the lower end of the astronaut corps," i.e. still pretty damn smart (by kerbal standards, anyhow). Given the Courage apparently runs from "brave enough to ride a kerbal-built rocket into space" to "brave enough to enjoy same," it'd make sense if full-stupidity was actually pretty sharp.

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I always thought Stupidity was a bit of a silly joke. Kerbals aren't stupid; they're foolhardy. [1] Their engineering is perfect; their engines always light, their tanks never leak, their airlocks never jam (and don't even take up any space). I'm glad MKS doesn't use it anymore.

[1] This is because they are haplodiploid, but that's a joke for another thread...

[revolioclockbergjr]

  On 1/29/2017 at 1:43 PM, damerell said:

haplodiploid

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That was worth the google search.

 

Possible bug, maybe someone else can test? I have an engineer in the Ranger Workshop. Every time she enters/leaves, her inventory vanishes. The workshop has eaten 4 drills and a bunch of EVA monoprop canisters. Seems to only be the case for the workshop.

[dboi88]

  On 1/29/2017 at 6:16 PM, revolioclockbergjr said:

That was worth the google search.

 

Possible bug, maybe someone else can test? I have an engineer in the Ranger Workshop. Every time she enters/leaves, her inventory vanishes. The workshop has eaten 4 drills and a bunch of EVA monoprop canisters. Seems to only be the case for the workshop.

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It's a known issue with KIS.

[jd284]

  On 1/29/2017 at 6:16 PM, revolioclockbergjr said:

Possible bug, maybe someone else can test? I have an engineer in the Ranger Workshop. Every time she enters/leaves, her inventory vanishes. The workshop has eaten 4 drills and a bunch of EVA monoprop canisters. Seems to only be the case for the workshop.

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That's a known issue with KIS, it applies to all parts that don't have crew capacity until you "do something" (like inflate it). Not just MKS although MKS has a lot of such parts.

  On 1/29/2017 at 1:43 PM, damerell said:

[1] This is because they are haplodiploid, but that's a joke for another thread...

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They're bees? I'd love to see how you know this...

[WuphonsReach]

Am I overlooking something, or are Organics not producible in situ and will always have to be shipped in from the home world?

 

[sh1pman]

Agriculture converter produces organics.

 

Edited January 30, 2017 by sh1pman

[dboi88]

  On 1/30/2017 at 11:56 AM, WuphonsReach said:

Am I overlooking something, or are Organics not producible in situ and will always have to be shipped in from the home world?

 

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Correct, you need a starting stock of Organics. The basic converters use things like algae based farms. The more advanced Organics are things like fish and plants which can't be obtained from a moon. Maybe we could create a way to collect organics from the sea's of Eve and Lathe?.

  On 1/30/2017 at 12:08 PM, sh1pman said:

Agriculture converter produces organics.

 

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As above a starting stock of Organics is needed

[blakemw]

I did some more testing of Kolony rewards. I started a new game (moderate difficulty) and beelined pioneer module. Along the way I recruited kerbals of almost random professions and levelled them up to lvl3 using standard minmus landing+kerbol peek-a-boo+mun orbit. Then I took 11 Kerbals and made a very simple Mun base (at this point I had nothing better than the 1.6EC/s solar panels so had no choice but to be simple). Of these 6/10 being Science, 8/10 being funds and and 5/10 being reputation. Everyone is unemployed on the base except Bob who is gainfully employed in a MPL to provide a baseline for comparison

Over the course of 30 days the Kolony Rewards were:

• 26 science (compared with 120 generated by Bob in MPL)
• 130k funds
• 52 rep

And here is how the balance feels to me:

• Science: Very underwhelming, a "science specialist" appears to generate science at a rate of about 1/25th that of a scientist in a MPL, or in other words you'd need about 50 science specialists to generate as much science as just two scientists in a lab - considering that lab science is limitless (because you can just replace the lab and refill it with gravity scans or whatever) and that those 50 science specialists would require a huge amount of upkeep a base is clearly not a very favorable way to generate science and will produce an almost irrelevant amount of science as long as you are doing literally anything else to get science.
• Funds: Excessive since even the most efficient base can easily be maintained through pure supply runs, even if the funds were reduced by half or two thirds it'd still be quite lucrative and could probably still be profitably maintained through supply runs, but by investing in recycling and agriculture it'd be nearly pure profit, only requiring the odd machinery shipment (or much more advanced manufacturing).
• Rep: Rep is ultimately fairly pointless and will probably be close to maxed out for practical purposes by the time pioneer modules are unlocked so I guess it doesn't matter, but I still feel it's maybe higher than it should be.

 

The way I'd probably balance it is to triple science rewards (or maybe even quintuple), reduce fund rewards to one third and maybe slightly reduce reputation, making the science relevant while not being buried in cash.

It would also be interesting if base operations effected the rewards (I assume at the moment it doesn't), for example having a MPL or other kind of labs could provide a science rewards multiplier as could having experiments (for example each unique experiment could provide a +50% science multiplier for 3 kerbals). That way just taking a bunch of kerbals and stuffing them in hitchhiker cans and abandoning them on the surface of the Mun with a pioneer module and a big box of supplies wouldn't be very lucrative but a base with a lot of labs and scientific equipment could rake in the science.

[Gilph]

  On 1/30/2017 at 12:19 PM, blakemw said:

I did some more testing of Kolony rewards. I started a new game (moderate difficulty) and beelined pioneer module. Along the way I recruited kerbals of almost random professions and levelled them up to lvl3 using standard minmus landing+kerbol peek-a-boo+mun orbit. Then I took 11 Kerbals and made a very simple Mun base (at this point I had nothing better than the 1.6EC/s solar panels so had no choice but to be simple). Of these 6/10 being Science, 8/10 being funds and and 5/10 being reputation. Everyone is unemployed on the base except Bob who is gainfully employed in a MPL to provide a baseline for comparison

Over the course of 30 days the Kolony Rewards were:

• 26 science (compared with 120 generated by Bob in MPL)
• 130k funds
• 52 rep

And here is how the balance feels to me:

• Science: Very underwhelming, a "science specialist" appears to generate science at a rate of about 1/25th that of a scientist in a MPL, or in other words you'd need about 50 science specialists to generate as much science as just two scientists in a lab - considering that lab science is limitless (because you can just replace the lab and refill it with gravity scans or whatever) and that those 50 science specialists would require a huge amount of upkeep a base is clearly not a very favorable way to generate science and will produce an almost irrelevant amount of science as long as you are doing literally anything else to get science.
• Funds: Excessive since even the most efficient base can easily be maintained through pure supply runs, even if the funds were reduced by half or two thirds it'd still be quite lucrative and could probably still be profitably maintained through supply runs, but by investing in recycling and agriculture it'd be nearly pure profit, only requiring the odd machinery shipment (or much more advanced manufacturing).
• Rep: Rep is ultimately fairly pointless and will probably be close to maxed out for practical purposes by the time pioneer modules are unlocked so I guess it doesn't matter, but I still feel it's maybe higher than it should be.

 

The way I'd probably balance it is to triple science rewards (or maybe even quintuple), reduce fund rewards to one third and maybe slightly reduce reputation, making the science relevant while not being buried in cash.

It would also be interesting if base operations effected the rewards (I assume at the moment it doesn't), for example having a MPL or other kind of labs could provide a science rewards multiplier as could having experiments (for example each unique experiment could provide a +50% science multiplier for 3 kerbals). That way just taking a bunch of kerbals and stuffing them in hitchhiker cans and abandoning them on the surface of the Mun with a pioneer module and a big box of supplies wouldn't be very lucrative but a base with a lot of labs and scientific equipment could rake in the science.

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This was very nicely done, thanks.

On the subject of science, I have thought the Ranger Comm module with the integrated science lab, was a bit awkward to use.  As a Ranger part, I guess the value is a lightweight part to get Science going in far away places.  But the very small data prevents you from analyzing all but the simplest experiments (the data values some experiments on far away planets can be pretty high), so it runs out of utility quickly.  I think your idea in the last paragraph is great. Maybe the lab in the Comm module could provide the multiplier you spoke of.

 

[DStaal]

I tend to think of the Ranger Comm as basically a place to clean out experiments - you can do research with it, but as you said it's fairly limited.  But it's nice to have the ability to clean out and reset all your experiments, board/EVA, and have an antenna, all in one part.