Kerbal Space Program update 1.4 Grand Discussion thread.

[severedsolo]

Can I ask what the logic was behind making EVA chutes only available for Level 3 up? I mean, it's cool that we got them at all, and I don't want to sound like I'm whinging, but it seems a bit of a strange requirement. "Jeb, you get a chute because you went to Duna, Val? Pfft, you've only been to orbit, you are on your own".

To my mind it would be better to tie it to the Astronaut Complex Level 3 upgrade (let's face it, nobody needs the top tier upgrades, it would help make them more useful)

[Tyko]

Thanks @squad! The update is great! I had a couple if things I noted for @RoverDude.

1. the new fairings are creating interference patterns when zoomed out far enough to see an entire rocket. (pic below)
2. The new 2.5m Fuel Tank black and white textures are rotated 10 degrees from that cardinal directions. You can see it with the black and white panels not lining up with the rest of the rocket (pic below)
3. Please fix the shrouds around heat shields.They have always looked silly, but as the rest of the parts become more sophisticated the giant thick shroud looks even more out of place (pic below)
4. Lastly a question - has there ever been an explanation for why the Oscar tank can hold about 3 times more fuel for it's volume than other tanks?

Thanks again!

Interference pattern

Tank textures not rotated to align with cardinal directions. Note the fin that's set on the "top" of the rocket and how it's not centered on the black stripe.

The heat shield shroud needs a shave.   

Edited March 7, 2018 by Tyko

[T1mo98]

Any chance to recolour the fairings so they are actually white? Right now they are more of a light grey, and they don't match that well with the other white parts. 

[Ventzi]

19 minutes ago, severedsolo said:

Can I ask what the logic was behind making EVA chutes only available for Level 3 up? I mean, it's cool that we got them at all, and I don't want to sound like I'm whinging, but it seems a bit of a strange requirement. "Jeb, you get a chute because you went to Duna, Val? Pfft, you've only been to orbit, you are on your own".

To my mind it would be better to tie it to the Astronaut Complex Level 3 upgrade (let's face it, nobody needs the top tier upgrades, it would help make them more useful)

obviously kerbals that are below level 3 are disposable........

[GoSlash27]

Kerbals have never needed parachutes. They're really just a stylish accessory.

Best,
-Slashy

[Rocket In My Pocket]

Might be going out on a limb here but;

At this point can we all just agree that the vast majority of players either use KER or MechJeb and get "dummy versions" of their respective required parts as hidden entries so as not to break saves while waiting for updates?

Just an idea!

(Also, if the lack of Kerbal portraits or IVA really bothers you on the new pod, just open up the Mk1-3's .cfg file and change the INTERNAL to "name = PodCockpit" and it will use the old Mk1-2 version.)

Edited March 7, 2018 by Rocket In My Pocket

[Ger_space]

Uhm guys, was it really neccessary to break Kerbal Konstructs in such a way and require it that the expansion is installed?

AddLaunchSite Call

Its already bad enough that I have to rename my classes but the new functionality, which should be already in use for LaunchPad and Runway, is a bit harsh. I'll wanted to buy the expansion anyway but I didn't wanted to force it on others. 

[tater]

26 minutes ago, severedsolo said:

Can I ask what the logic was behind making EVA chutes only available for Level 3 up? I mean, it's cool that we got them at all, and I don't want to sound like I'm whinging, but it seems a bit of a strange requirement. "Jeb, you get a chute because you went to Duna, Val? Pfft, you've only been to orbit, you are on your own".

To my mind it would be better to tie it to the Astronaut Complex Level 3 upgrade (let's face it, nobody needs the top tier upgrades, it would help make them more useful)

This. For the next expansion, the purpose of personal chutes is likely that Vostok had the cosmonaut bailing out to land with their own chute. Which would be the very first possible crew flight.

Seems like chutes should pre-exist to spaceflight.

[Dunbaratu]

For the optional DLC coming soon, will we modders need to release two simultaneous releases of mods, one for users with the DLC, and one for users without the DLC?  (i.e. if non-DLC is version 1.4, and with-DLC is version 1.4.1.)

I currently maintain a backward port of kOS to KSP 1.2.2 just because of Realism Overhaul always being a revision or two behind, but it's kind of a pain to keep a back-port active and I'd like to not have to start maintaining more of them because with-DLC and without-DLC users are on two different versions of KSP.

Edited March 7, 2018 by Steven Mading
(My original post had mismatched parentheses, which bothers the programmer in me)

[Atkara]

1 hour ago, RoverDude said:

We did not remove the old parts - they were specifically left in for backwards compatibility (they are just hidden).

That's true and thank you guys for keeping them there. From what I understood by reading the changelog though, they will eventually be removed. So I took the liberty to back them up, in case I wake up one morning and find that 80% of my ingame infrastructure (deployed, or in transit) has vanished 

Other than that and besides a couple of issues I understand will be addressed in 1.4.1, the update looks good so far

[Adelaar]

7 minutes ago, tater said:

This. For the next expansion, the purpose of personal chutes is likely that Vostok had the cosmonaut bailing out to land with their own chute. Which would be the very first possible crew flight.

Seems like chutes should pre-exist to spaceflight.

No, this is Kerbin. Personal parachutes were only invented after Evel Kerman realized it would be way cooler to jump out of a lander capsule than just sit on your lazy bum until it landed.

[sarbian]

15 minutes ago, Rocket In My Pocket said:

Might be going out on a limb here but;

At this point can we all just agree that the vast majority of players either use KER or MechJeb and get "dummy versions" of their respective required parts as hidden entries so as not to break saves while waiting for updates?

Just an idea!

(Also, if the lack of Kerbal portraits or IVA really bothers you on the new pod, just open up the Mk1-3's .cfg file and change the INTERNAL to "name = PodCockpit" and it will use the old Mk1-2 version.)

No. If they do that then those nods dev will have to deal with the "that part is here but it s not working". We have more than enough support to deal with already. The game warns you when you load old save and steam let you revert to an older version.

[Dunbaratu]

Just now, sarbian said:

No. If they do that then those nods dev will have to deal with the "that part is here but it s not working". We have more than enough support to deal with already. The game warns you when you load old save and steam let you revert to an older version.

I agree with not having them do this, just because it would mean "some mods are more equal" than other mods.  "We'll do a bit more work to help the popular mods, but not the unpopular ones" doesn't seem like a reasonable dividing line because then they have to decide what counts as "popular *enough*" to do this.

[Rocket In My Pocket]

6 minutes ago, sarbian said:

No. If they do that then those nods dev will have to deal with the "that part is here but it s not working". We have more than enough support to deal with already. The game warns you when you load old save and steam let you revert to an older version.

Personally I'd rather just have a non-functional part on a ship, rather than having the entire ship deleted.

You are gonna get complaints about it not working either way.

Obviously though, I'll have to respect your opinion concerning MechJeb.

3 minutes ago, Steven Mading said:

I agree with not having them do this, just because it would mean "some mods are more equal" than other mods.  "We'll do a bit more work to help the popular mods, but not the unpopular ones" doesn't seem like a reasonable dividing line because then they have to decide what counts as "popular *enough*" to do this.

Some mods literally are more equal than others.

Pretending it isn't true doesn't change anything.

I guess ultimately it doesn't matter to me though? Was more a QOL thought for others. I'm more than capable of doing what I'm proposing on my own for my own game.

Edited March 7, 2018 by Rocket In My Pocket

[DoctorDavinci]

9 minutes ago, Adelaar said:

No, this is Kerbin. Personal parachutes were only invented after Evel Kerman realized it would be way cooler to jump out of a lander capsule than just sit on your lazy bum until it landed.

Not true ... Like @GoSlash27 said above, they're just accessories (like a purse or something)

Long time ago, in a KSP version far far away we used to land kerbals on their heads if they were coming in for a splattery landing

Spoiler

 

 

[sarbian]

Just now, Rocket In My Pocket said:

Personally I'd rather just have a non-functional part on a ship, rather than having the entire ship deleted.

You are gonna get complaints about it not working either way.

Obviously though, I'll have to respect your opinion concerning MechJeb.

Get them to add a OK/ABORT dialog before deleting thing. That would work for all mods and not just the chosen few.

[taniwha]

1 minute ago, Rocket In My Pocket said:

Personally I'd rather just have a non-functional part on a ship, rather than having the entire ship deleted.

That's exactly what happens when only a part module is missing, but a whole part? What's KSP supposed to do with that?

[Rocket In My Pocket]

Just now, sarbian said:

Get them to add a OK/ABORT dialog before deleting thing. That would work for all mods and not just the chosen few.

I'm all for that as well, certainly!

Just now, taniwha said:

That's exactly what happens when only a part module is missing, but a whole part? What's KSP supposed to do with that?

The same thing they did with the old Mk1-2, have it in the game files, but hidden so you can't build with it.

[taniwha]

4 minutes ago, Rocket In My Pocket said:

The same thing they did with the old Mk1-2, have it in the game files, but hidden so you can't build with it.

It's not about building or not building with a missing part, it's about going to a vessel to find a hole where the part should be.

Edited March 7, 2018 by taniwha
hominyms :P

[Rocket In My Pocket]

11 minutes ago, taniwha said:

It's not about building or not building with a missing part, it's about going to a vessel to find a hole where the part should be.

Right, and the game will have the part it's supposed to have to place in the hole.

Not sure what you're missing here? (Maybe I'm not explaining it well?)

Game looks at saved ship>Game gets to KER part>Game looks for KER part>Game doesn't find KER part>Game deletes ship. If the KER part was there to find, as a "dummy part" even with none of the other stuff that makes it functional for the mod, the game could place it and move on. This is basically the same thing they did for the old versions of the updated parts, so that your old vessels using them can still exist in the new version.

Edited March 7, 2018 by Rocket In My Pocket

[taniwha]

Go back to sarbian's comment. There's no way Squad should be providing even dummy parts for mods. I very much agree with his ok/cancel suggestion, though.

It's just a matter of patience.

[Dunbaratu]

3 minutes ago, taniwha said:

It's not about building or not building with a missing part, it's about going to a vessel to find a hole where the part should be.

And because of the tree structure of the vessel, missing that part data means not knowing how to draw the REST of that branch of the vessel because you are missing the part model that tells you the dimensions of the missing piece.  Even if you want to join up the child of the missing part to its grandparent, skipping the missing part between, you'd still need to know if the child part of the missing part is supposed to begin 3 meters away from the grandparent part?  or maybe 5 meters?  1 meter?   The game has no clue because those dimensions were in the missing part.  If it tries to construct the vessel on a guess about that, it ends up drawing the rest of that branch in the wrong spot and creating clipping and collisions where they shouldn't be, changes to center of mass, misaligned engines, etc.

Asking the game engine to reconstruct a vessel while missing the dimensions and node attachment information about a missing part definition is just impossible.  What might work, though, is a better signalling of the warning about the vessel before it deletes it.  (i.e. "We have found 2 vessels we will have to delete if we continue loading this save.  Here's a list of their vessel names and current locations and offending part(s): (i.e. My Probe 1, in orbit of Duna, 'FASA XL200 tank'' :  Kerpollo 1, landed at Mun" 'CSX4192 kOS core') Are you sure you want to continue loading this save given that these vessels will go away?")  The generic warning that some vessels might go away depending on mods isn't as clear as actually naming them after you discover it will definitely happen, and then giving an option to back out at that point.

[Rocket In My Pocket]

3 minutes ago, taniwha said:

Go back to sarbian's comment. There's no way Squad should be providing even dummy parts for mods. I very much agree with his ok/cancel suggestion, though.

It's just a matter of patience.

If your opinion is that it "shouldn't" be done, that's fair enough.

Just saying, it could be done with the addition of two very small and harmless part folders added quietly to the stock download. Would likely alleviate a large percentage of deleted ship scenarios.

However, yeah; I'm totally for the confirmation pop up. Would work for every mod, instead of just the most popular. But; you still would have to wait to play your save game.

Edited March 7, 2018 by Rocket In My Pocket

[taniwha]

2 minutes ago, Steven Mading said:

And because of the tree structure of the vessel, missing that part data means not knowing how to draw the REST of that branch of the vessel because you are missing the part model that tells you the dimensions of the missing piece. 

Not quite. The other parts would be in the right places, but their attachments would be broken. Also, the game would have no idea what the mass should be.

 

1 minute ago, Rocket In My Pocket said:

Just saying, it could be done with the addition of two very small and harmless part folders added quietly to the stock download. Would likely alleviate a large percentage of deleted ship scenarios.

Of course it could be done, but it's likely to cause more trouble in the long run. Also, very few people that use mods use only one or two. It's just not practical.

[Rocket In My Pocket]

4 minutes ago, taniwha said:

Of course it could be done, but it's likely to cause more trouble in the long run. Also, very few people that use mods use only one or two. It's just not practical.

Granted. Certainly.

Although, players who use tons of part mods tend to realize there will be a problem when they don't have said parts for the update though.

I see a lot of confused players when it comes to MechJeb/KER because they don't understand that something as simple as one little part they slapped onto the side will make the entire thing not work. Like I said, it's not really a problem for me, excepting that I end up having to explain it a hundred times to a hundred different people lol. Anyways...it was an off hand suggestion with no real hope that it would ever be executed by Squad.

Edited March 7, 2018 by Rocket In My Pocket