[1.12.4] Kerbin Side Remastered GAP - Flight contract pack [v2.1.7] [2022-12-19]

[Caerfinon]

Current Status:

• Issue 18 - Bug - Accepted Navy Rescue/Patrol Missions fail when craft from other contracts are damaged.
  • Fix is to add Navy Observer to flights to prevent mission conditions aligning with other contract requirements - Fixed files posted to GitHub and will be included in next release
• Issue 14 - Enhancement -  Multi-site flight Airline fights with multiple destinations
  • Play testing mission based around Meeda Naval Air Station - 9 additional flights posted to GitHub and will be included in next release

Edited December 24, 2020 by Caerfinon
Status Update

[Caerfinon]

Version 1.1.4 on Spacedock - Happy Christmas

• Issue #14 - Enhancement - Multi-site flight Airline fights with multiple destinations
  •  added 18 flights for Meeda and Kojave Sands
• Issue #16 - Bug - Synopsis text for Flight 1030 incorrect - fixed
• Issue #17 - Bug - Lt. Dan Kerman graphic displays upside down in Dialog boxes during Navy Certification missions - fixed
• Issue #18 - Bug - Accepted Navy Rescue/Patrol Missions fail when craft from other contracts are damaged. - fixed
  •    Enhancement - added optional seaplane landing to patrol missions

 

[Daniel Prates]

What a wonderful mod. 

Thanks @Caerfinon, I am having a blast with this.

[Caerfinon]

@Daniel Prates Glad you like it. I'm enjoying putting it together a great deal.

[Daniel Prates]

11 minutes ago, Caerfinon said:

@Daniel Prates Glad you like it. I'm enjoying putting it together a great deal.

I used the other, older side+gap for years and it took me a while to take a chance and try this newer one. Boy am I glad I did it.  The runways are more realistic, the contracts are a joy and adding nav utilities support, well, that is just a labour of love.

[Caerfinon]

The Next items on the "Road Map" are;

Hinterland Tours:

• float-plane landings on tiny bodies of water across Kerbin

UK (United Knations):

• Transport flights of VIPs from one location to another, 
• Cargo flights between bases, 
• Relief flights - delivery of supplies to remote locations via airdrop or combination air/land travel 

KIA: Mr White has some jobs that need doing...

• Move agents between major bases
• Stealth Para-drop Agents to remote assignments 
• Agent extraction and return

[Caerfinon]

Current Status:

• Kerbin Side Hinterland Tours Issue 20 - Enhancement/Roadmap - Files are now on GitHub and will be available in next release. (See Wiki)
• Multi-Site flights for Round Range Airfield Issue 14 - Enhancement/Roadmap - Files are now on GitHub and will be available in next release
• Some minor edits (flag resizing, fixing bad spelling, replacing NAS ATC dialog portraits) also on GitHub.

You can download from GitHub by clicking the code button and selecting down load as zip. then manually updating your version in your Gamedata\contract packs directory

 

[Daniel Prates]

@Caerfinon tell me something. So I have to do the 'inspect' missions in order to unlock proper airline contracts. Ok, great design choice. However ... for some reason, in the proper airline contracts, I only get one at any given time. The others (which were supposed to be available since I did the pre-requisite 'inspection' contract do not appear as valid contracts since it marks as 'unmet' that I cannot have more than one contract OFFERED at any given time. 

Is that by design? As soon as I unlock several flights via the 'inspection' contract, I kinda expect all of them (the ones I unlocked anyway) to be available all the time - so if I feel like a long flight, or a short one, they are all there to pick. 

Is it a bug or intentional?

[Caerfinon]

1 hour ago, Daniel Prates said:

Is it a bug or intentional

Nice feedback. thanks

It was intentional with the rationalization that If they  were "all" available all the time it would swamp out other contract providers. Also the three regular flights to a base need to be unlocked 1 then 2 then 3 (the third one also requires mk3 crew cabin to be unlocked as having the 16 seats available is probably the only way to realistically build a craft supporting 80 or so seats.) 

In the groups.cfg file, each of the contract groups is set to "maxSimultaneous = 1" which means one at a time. You could change that value to a 3 or 4 (or more to suit your taste) and have multiple flights available per contract group. The individual contracts are also limited to 1 at a time in the flight.cfg files. I wouldn't change that setting. but playing around with the group setting seems OK.

The inspection missions are designed to happen one at a time and progress in order.

The new Hinterland contract has only one contract.cfg file so it only gets called one at a time. 

I've noticed in my low tech career play through that I get a lot of repeats of the same missions, so I am considering mucking around with this and finding a balance for general release.

FYI - If you do change your groups.cfg file you will need to change it each time you upgrade the package to the values you've selected.   

[Caerfinon]

2 hours ago, Daniel Prates said:

I kinda expect all of them

So I took a look at he original Kerbinside Gap settings, and the groups.cfg has multiple sessions per group defined. So I get why you expected more of them. So I am going to play-test it out and see what happens. Stay tuned.

[Daniel Prates]

You see @Caerfinon you wanted to make things challenging, which is fair, so you made a system where you have to first unlock a contract (the 'inspection' contracts) so that the proper airline contracts were unlocked. That's great. However once I unlock several airline contracts, why can't I chose the one I want to fly today?  The idea that only one is available at any given time is not a challenge, it is a hindrance. Suppose I just designed a long-range passenger plane and i want to test it. I go to the available contracts screen (not the inspection, the proper airline contracts) and ... it only gives me a flight to Island Airfield. I click it and cancel it... and another one to island airfield becomes available. I accept it and auto-finish it with alt+12... and the island contract is given again. That is not fun, its obnoxious and limiting. 

What I would do: keep the 'inspection' contracts. But once I do an inspection contract, the correspondent airline contract (towards the same airfield, that is) will always be open. So every time I do an inspection contract, that is one more airline contract to be ALWAYS available at all times. So I can fly whatever I want, as long as I unlocked it first. 

Or at the very least, if I already unlocked say 10 airline contracts, make it at least 4 or 5 of them available at any given time. 

[Caerfinon]

@Daniel Prates Issue 21 has been opened to track this change.  The current change is on GitHub now and will be included in the next release.

So because I'm on vacation, and because my dogs wake me up a 6AM, I've had some time to dig into this, and I've decided to reproduce the structure from the Original Kerbin Side GAP Groups.cfg which is;

• Trans Kerbin Airlines Group can have 8 simultaneous flights offered
  • Trans Kerbin Airlines Prime is now a child group that can have three fights offered (assuming the part requirement is unlocked otherwise only flights from the parent will be offered)
  • Trans Kerbin Airlines Inspections  is now a child group that can have one flight offered at any time until all bases are flown to then this spot will be allocated to the other two groups
• The Navy will have 3 simultaneous flights offered at any given time.
• All groups, parent or child can be enabled or disabled in the Contract Configurator settings.
• All individual flight contracts will remain configured to be active only once at any give time, so you won't get multiple copies of the same flight.
• Mission progression has been changed to depend only on the initial base open flight and any part requirement that may be required.

 Caveats from testing

• Occasionally you'll get two flights to the same airport ( ie FLT 1001 & FLT 1002) that you may want to combine as a single mission. This will work, but;
  • ATC: dialogs get a little messed up and can fire out of order and in the wrong situations. To fix this would require changing parameter names to be unique across all individual  flight CFG files which is not something I want to rework at this time. The issue is just cosmetic as it has no effect on the progress of the missions and both will complete or fail at the same time.
  • Tourist spam issues (and this holds true for all missions)
    • If a crew compartment gets disconnected from the main craft and somehow survives the crash with tourists inside, They become unattached tourists in the Astronaut Complex if you recover the part. The only way to prevent this is to revert the flight to launch or SPH.
    • If the crew compartments do not detach from the vessel then the passengers from the multiple contracts are lost as normal together. 

 

You can download from GitHub by clicking the code button and selecting down load as zip. then manually updating your version in your Gamedata\contract packs directory

[Daniel Prates]

11 minutes ago, Caerfinon said:

@Daniel Prates Issue 21 has been opened to track this change.  The current change is on GitHub now and will be included in the next release.

So because I'm on vacation, and because my dogs wake me up a 6AM, I've had some time to dig into this, and I've decided to reproduce the structure from the Original Kerbin Side GAP Groups.cfg which is;

• Trans Kerbin Airlines Group can have 8 simultaneous flights offered
  • Trans Kerbin Airlines Prime is now a child group that can have three fights offered (assuming the part requirement is unlocked otherwise only flights from the parent will be offered)
  • Trans Kerbin Airlines Inspections  is now a child group that can have one flight offered at any time until all bases are flown to then this spot will be allocated to the other two groups
• The Navy will have 3 simultaneous flights offered at any given time.
• All groups, parent or child can be enabled or disabled in the Contract Configurator settings.
• All individual flight contracts will remain configured to be active only once at any give time, so you won't get multiple copies of the same flight.
• Mission progression has been changed to depend only on the initial base open flight and any part requirement that may be required.

 Caveats from testing

• Occasionally you'll get two flights to the same airport ( ie FLT 1001 & FLT 1002) that you may want to combine as a single mission. This will work, but;
  • ATC: dialogs get a little messed up and can fire out of order and in the wrong situations. To fix this would require changing parameter names to be unique across all individual  flight CFG files which is not something I want to rework at this time. The issue is just cosmetic as it has no effect on the progress of the missions and both will complete or fail at the same time.
  • Tourist spam issues (and this holds true for all missions)
    • If a crew compartment gets disconnected from the main craft and somehow survives the crash with tourists inside, They become unattached tourists in the Astronaut Complex if you recover the part. The only way to prevent this is to revert the flight to launch or SPH.
    • If the crew compartments do not detach from the vessel then the passengers from the multiple contracts are lost as normal together. 

 

You can download from GitHub by clicking the code button and selecting down load as zip. then manually updating your version in your Gamedata\contract packs directory

Allright! Let's get to testing!

[Caerfinon]

3 hours ago, Daniel Prates said:

Let's get to testing!

 FYI - I moved Inspections back to parent level group so it wouldn't have to compete for spots with other TKA missions. Now 22 base open flights will be available in order from start until they are all done. New Groups.cfg  on GitHub.

[Caerfinon]

Current Status:

• Issue 20 - Enhancement/Roadmap - Added Remote Hinterland Bush Plane Adventure mission - Available on GitHub now. Will be included in next release.
  • Based on @nightingale's Field Research HardScience.cfg contract  (but requires no science collection... just for the flying )
  • Requires transport of 2-3 passengers to very unique locations around Kerbin.
  • planes will require equal capabilities to land on water or solid ground in the wilds
  • Can start and finish at any airport for recovery

You can download from GitHub by clicking the code button and selecting down load as zip. then manually updating your version in your Gamedata\contract packs directory

[Roland1999]

Caerfinon thank you for your work! Really enjoying doing these contracts.

Here is my craft for initial test flights:

Spoiler

 

[Caerfinon]

Just now, Roland1999 said:

Here is my craft for initial test flights:

That's a nice looking ship! I'm glad you are having fun with the contracts. I have some neat ones for sea planes in the next release...  Soon (TM)

[Beetlecat]

4 minutes ago, Roland1999 said:

Caerfinon thank you for your work! Really enjoying doing these contracts.

Here is my craft for initial test flights:

  Reveal hidden contents

 

That's quite a craft. I'm getting wildly anxious about the idea of trying to fly / land it in FAR.

[Roland1999]

2 minutes ago, Beetlecat said:

That's quite a craft. I'm getting wildly anxious about the idea of trying to fly / land it in FAR.

I am using FAR and it works very well, reaching mach 4, and lands at about 90 m/s.

[Caerfinon]

Version 1.1.5 now on Spacedock.

Issue #21 Cannot have more than one contract OFFERED

• Contract Groups restructured to allow more than 1 simultaneous flight

Issue #14 Multi-site flight Airline fights with multiple destinations

• Addition of flights to Round Range added and complete this enhancement

Issue #20 Kerbin Side Hinterland Tours

• Addition of contracts for wilderness flights for seaplanes and ground landings in Kerbin's hinterlands

Ongoing Issue - Various spelling and grammar corrections because I never paid attention in school.

[Caerfinon]

Current Status:

I've added a new flight plan for Kramax Auto Pilot for Runway KSC 27. The default flight plan "KSC ILS 27" is designed for space planes returning from orbit on a heading of 90 and then looping around to heading 270 for a landing.

The new flight plan provides the standard MAXKY, HIKEY and LOKEY waypoints for a commercial route landing pattern on heading 270 only. It's available on GitHub now and will be included in the next release.   

 

[Caerfinon]

Current Status:

Play-testing a Disaster Relief contract.

• Disaster Site randomly located
• Relief supplies need to be delivered to site using one of the following methods;
  • Direct aircraft landing at the disaster site in the wild
  • Aircraft transports a probe that is then para-dropped/landed at disaster site.
  • Airlift a rover to nearby airport and then drive to disaster site (You could also para-drop the rover too)

[Caerfinon]

20 minutes ago, Caerfinon said:

then drive to disaster site

As a side note... the Grounded mod is really useful for building vehicles that can fit inside a MK3 cargo hold for airlifting around Kerbin.   

 

 

 

[Caerfinon]

Current Status

• Disaster Relief mission Issue 22 - Enhancement/Roadmap - deliver relief supplies to various locations on Kerbin by aircraft landing, cargo drops, or airlifted ground transport
  • First mission for United Knations agency.
  • Available on GitHub now. Will be included in next release.
• Continued work on new UK missions

[Caerfinon]

Current status

• UK Transport mission play-testing
  • Second United Knations Mission.
  • requires manual pickup of a VIK (Very Important Kerbal) and transporting them to a destination airport for "official government functions".
  • At destination only the passenger needs to be recovered if you want to return your aircraft to some other location to recover it.
    • You really need to make sure the VIK can board and leave the plane while landed