Local orientation and better Docking view.

[BechMeister]

hello all!

I have a feeling a few of you will know the One-Person project "Flight of Nova" - which kind of bridge KSP and games like Star Citizen/Elite Dangerous etc.
I feel the game has some really nice features i would love to see in KSP 2 when docking and approaching another craft/station/target.

I really like the local marker you have in Flight of Nova, that makes it really easy to know your local direction to the target. Seen here:


You can see the Blue arror showing the retrograde of the orbit around the planet and the yellow marker called "Local" being the direction i am moving in accordance to the target.

here you see the Prograde and my "Anti-local" (the docking platform i left from) The square with AL-778 and a distance is another space station for the people who don't know the game.

I think this really helps knowing how much i need to thrust left, right, up, down to get to the target.

I also think the game has a really good docking port view:


With all the relevant info to dock up with the docking port. I guess KSP 2 has the camera called "body" - but i think if we could get a camera that looks from the PoW from any docking port we put on a craft, with the option to cycle through them if there are more. And some interface like this we are in a good spot.

I also often miss a mode were i can see my velocity compared to the target (If it exist in game.. i dont know how to get it up) - I tend to get my distance and relative speed from the map.. and its a lot of cycling back and forth to finetune my approach x)

Anyway! I think these two additions would be pretty great for KSP2

[Sea_Kerman]

AFAIK the navball does show direction to target and target-relative prograde and retrograde.

[BechMeister]

Doesnt it just point to the direction of the target and not your relative motion to the target? 

The local marker in Flight of Nova shows your motion in relation to the target. Meaning you can see if you are moving to or Normal/Anti-normal with your RCS thrusters. 

I think it can be really hard to gauge if i am still moving Radial/anti-radial to the target or normal/anti-normal when i am approaching the ship/station.

 

With Flight of Nova's local it is easy.. you just rcs thrust normal/anti-normal and Radial/Anti-Radial until the local mark is touching the target mark and then you know you are not drifting off when approaching. 

right now all i can do is see if the pixels shift to the left/right or up/down while the number decreases... since pointing at the target and boosting will not get you to the target but to the target were it was when you pointed at it relatively to where you were when you pointed at it... which means you need to micro ajust constantly.  It takes a lot of work that you have to eye ball it.

 

So not having local, and the ability to switch to relative speed to target makes the last bit of rendezvous a tedious affair, and a lot of back and forth to me. I tend i use the map more to see when im sub 100m but the map does not show if im moving 11m/s normal or radial.

 

I may be wrong though i am a new KSP2 player and never got into KSP1

I just really like how Flight of Nova did the interface and how local show up when you're close to the target. It could become visible sub 1000m or heck it would be nice even at 100m to show how much your off on your approach to the docking port your trying to hit

 

[Sea_Kerman]

I know in KSP1 the prograde/retrograde markers switched to show target-relative motion when you put the navball in target mode

I'll try in 2

[Flush Foot]

On 4/4/2023 at 1:42 PM, BechMeister said:

Doesnt it just point to the direction of the target and not your relative motion to the target? 

You can toggle the KSP navball mode (KSP 1 and 2) between Orbital and Surface, and also ‘Target’ if you have a target selected. Then, in Target mode, if your relative velocity is above 1 m/s you can have SAS auto-target prograde/retrograde relative to the target, otherwise you can just ‘spin around’ until you find those markers.

[BechMeister]

How do i do this?  toggle between orbital and target?

I have tried to look for it in input - I can't find the hotkey to change what my naveball is doing. Or make it show my speed relative to the target.

Edited April 9, 2023 by BechMeister

[BechMeister]

On 4/7/2023 at 7:34 PM, Flush Foot said:

You can toggle the KSP navball mode (KSP 1 and 2) between Orbital and Surface, and also ‘Target’ if you have a target selected. Then, in Target mode, if your relative velocity is above 1 m/s you can have SAS auto-target prograde/retrograde relative to the target, otherwise you can just ‘spin around’ until you find those markers.

I have finaly found out that you can press the velocity box and get relative speed to target.. and turning your prograde/retrograde into what is called Local/Anti-Local in Flight of Nova.

I still think a dedicated docking view that shows your angles and such - like there is in Flight of Nova would be nice

[MagicCuboid]

 For me, it's Docking Port Alignment Indicator all the way. It's a little overpowered compared to what astronauts actually had on the Gemini and Apollo, but then again they had autopilot for most things.

[BechMeister]

Yeah something like that, native in the game would be awesome.

[EvelynThe Dragon]

I miss MechJeb 2 a lot. I had a  custom target info window that gave me all the info I need for manual docking. Distance to target in all axes, speed relative to the target in all axes, and relative orbit information regarding the target.

It was magnificent. 

I am really dissatisfied with KSP2 docking. It's a pain in the but, and the force of docking is ridiculous. In real space operations, docking is a gentle kiss, not bumper cars like it is in KSP2, I could get a realistic docking in KSP1, not in KSP 2.

[BechMeister]

I hear ya Evelyn - I had to dock this pretty big SSTO refueling drone where i put the docking bay in the cargo hatch. Obscuring the two points that need to connect a lot.



At the point i didn't know you could press your velocity to change from Orbit/Ground/Target to your relative speed to target (I really think they should tell/show that feature better graphically).. and your prograde/retrograde would then change to what is called "local" / "anti-local" in Flight of Nova. It would have made it a lot easier.. since you can set the docking port as the point of control.. and the docking port you want to hit as target. and then just make sure the two markers are on top of each other. This is still a mediocre solution compared to Flight of Nova.. as, like you say, you cant see how much your angle is off on all the axis and you have to think to correct drift by moving the marker counter to the target to count for drift.. where in flight of nova, you just have arrows on all axis showing you what way you drift. Making it easy to counter. 

So... it meant that i had to zoom in real hard and just eye ball it.. it was rather frustrating as i kept having to change camera angle 90° to check i did not drift while aligning one angle xD - I succeeded.. but man.