Wobbly rockets (For Science!)

[Vl3d]

1. The autostrut implementation removes excessive wobbliness and make the rockets feel rigid - let's say plasticy instead of rubbery.
2. Autostrut also removes the challenge of unstable SAS and the feedback-control-loop that made flying rockets an interactive effort.
3. I like that I can build craft without having to worry about placing a lot of struts.
4. I don't like that I can build craft that should definitely have some struts to avoid breaking (not bending) in half.

The point is this: let's say we go forward with this level of craft rigidity and we forget all about "kerbal rockets should have some wobbliness". Then what do we add to the game that makes flying rockets more interesting and interactive? Clearly something is missing now.
IMO, I've always been a fan of having better physics like drag, aero-effects and heating instead of wobblyness. So I say...

The time of wobble has passed. It's time to add wind to the game!

Edited December 21, 2023 by Vl3d

[tstein]

1 hour ago, Vl3d said:

1. The autostrut implementation removes excessive wobbliness and make the rockets feel rigid - let's say plasticy instead of rubbery.
2. Autostrut also removes the challenge of unstable SAS and the feedback-control-loop that made flying rockets an interactive effort.
3. I like that I can build craft without having to worry about placing a lot of struts.
4. I don't like that I can build craft that should definitely have some struts to avoid breaking (not bending) in half.

The point is this: let's say we go forward with this level of craft rigidity and we forget all about "kerbal rockets should have some wobbliness". Then what do we add to the game that makes flying rockets more interesting and interactive? Clearly something is missing now.
IMO, I've always been a fan of having better physics like drag, aero-effects and heating instead of wobblyness. So I say...

The time of wobble has passed. It's time to add wind to the game!

Flying should not be the hard part, IMHO, designing them  should be. Rockets are not to be very hard to keep stable (when intact) otherwise V2 with basically no guidance would have never worked.  Rockets may be hard to fly EFFICIENTLY and that is something that I think  could be up to some tuning.

[Vl3d]

6 minutes ago, tstein said:

Flying should not be the hard part, IMHO, designing them  should be. Rockets are not to be very hard to keep stable (when intact) otherwise V2 with basically no guidance would have never worked.  Rockets may be hard to fly EFFICIENTLY and that is something that I think  could be up to some tuning.

Nowhere in the OP did I mention flying rockets should be difficult if designed correctly. What I did mention is the fact that rockets don't provide feeling / feedback like they do in KSP 1. It's like when driving cars - you have to feel the controls - just like you have to feel the navball in the game.

[tstein]

13 minutes ago, Vl3d said:

Nowhere in the OP did I mention flying rockets should be difficult if designed correctly. What I did mention is the fact that rockets don't provide feeling / feedback like they do in KSP 1. It's like when driving cars - you have to feel the controls - just like you have to feel the navball in the game.

Well without   a force feedback joystick the only way  I can  see you feeling it woudl be  with  "unnatural" instability (and that is  usually hard to control properly).  . We could add shaking although..  shaking that reflect in navball would add some feeling of  immense  force

[Dakitess]

Agree that in the videos I've seen, it feels really too much rigid, or more precisely, too much solid, rough, robust. It ain't wobble and bend ? Fine, make it snap !

Since it won't be really easy to do so, wobble and struts might be a good thing to fine-tune. Indeed, it's totally not OK to get a very well designed rocket, realistic, with good proportion, to bend over like a wet a noodle. Unacceptable, unenjoyable. But it's neither not OK to get a weird contraption flying straight while it would OBVIOUSLY bend / break. 

Lot of players were legit afraid of that, to loose a whole part of design visual failure feedback and it happened. Or I guess, I must say, did not try it for now, but videos are quite explicit.

I remember reading that part snipping because of over constraint would not allow the player to understand why / where / how it failed. Indeed if the thing collapse suddenly, it's hard to improve it. But just like we have heat gauges, and just like some bridges construction gate have Mechanical Stress gauges, we could have something like this, something that would show the player that damn, this part is having a hard time and will break very soon. 

I still guess that a legit small quantity of wobble is a good thing, as a physic implementation. It already exist(ed), it's there, we have tool to fight against it when needed (struts), it just need to be fine tuned and, ideally, "logic" and coherent, regarding what assemble is clearly a whole big constant diameter cylinder that should act accordingly. And what it a mechanical entanglement that is a legit point of weakness. What part, even with the same good diameter that below and above, is a legit point of weakness. Decouplers, docking port, etc. There is a lot of intelligence to put in this game aspect, it's not hard (not speaking of dev here), it just need to be thought correctly, I guess.

[tstein]

55 minutes ago, Dakitess said:

Agree that in the videos I've seen, it feels really too much rigid, or more precisely, too much solid, rough, robust. It ain't wobble and bend ? Fine, make it snap !

Since it won't be really easy to do so, wobble and struts might be a good thing to fine-tune. Indeed, it's totally not OK to get a very well designed rocket, realistic, with good proportion, to bend over like a wet a noodle. Unacceptable, unenjoyable. But it's neither not OK to get a weird contraption flying straight while it would OBVIOUSLY bend / break. 

Lot of players were legit afraid of that, to loose a whole part of design visual failure feedback and it happened. Or I guess, I must say, did not try it for now, but videos are quite explicit.

I remember reading that part snipping because of over constraint would not allow the player to understand why / where / how it failed. Indeed if the thing collapse suddenly, it's hard to improve it. But just like we have heat gauges, and just like some bridges construction gate have Mechanical Stress gauges, we could have something like this, something that would show the player that damn, this part is having a hard time and will break very soon. 

I still guess that a legit small quantity of wobble is a good thing, as a physic implementation. It already exist(ed), it's there, we have tool to fight against it when needed (struts), it just need to be fine tuned and, ideally, "logic" and coherent, regarding what assemble is clearly a whole big constant diameter cylinder that should act accordingly. And what it a mechanical entanglement that is a legit point of weakness. What part, even with the same good diameter that below and above, is a legit point of weakness. Decouplers, docking port, etc. There is a lot of intelligence to put in this game aspect, it's not hard (not speaking of dev here), it just need to be thought correctly, I guess.

They do snap. I had   rockets snapping yesterday.  They  just  do not wobble  at normal operation  paraameters. It is a HUGE improvement.

[Vl3d]

2 hours ago, Dakitess said:

Agree that in the videos I've seen, it feels really too much rigid, or more precisely, too much solid, rough, robust. It ain't wobble and bend ? Fine, make it snap !

Since it won't be really easy to do so, wobble and struts might be a good thing to fine-tune. Indeed, it's totally not OK to get a very well designed rocket, realistic, with good proportion, to bend over like a wet a noodle. Unacceptable, unenjoyable. But it's neither not OK to get a weird contraption flying straight while it would OBVIOUSLY bend / break. 

Lot of players were legit afraid of that, to loose a whole part of design visual failure feedback and it happened. Or I guess, I must say, did not try it for now, but videos are quite explicit.

I remember reading that part snipping because of over constraint would not allow the player to understand why / where / how it failed. Indeed if the thing collapse suddenly, it's hard to improve it. But just like we have heat gauges, and just like some bridges construction gate have Mechanical Stress gauges, we could have something like this, something that would show the player that damn, this part is having a hard time and will break very soon. 

I still guess that a legit small quantity of wobble is a good thing, as a physic implementation. It already exist(ed), it's there, we have tool to fight against it when needed (struts), it just need to be fine tuned and, ideally, "logic" and coherent, regarding what assemble is clearly a whole big constant diameter cylinder that should act accordingly. And what it a mechanical entanglement that is a legit point of weakness. What part, even with the same good diameter that below and above, is a legit point of weakness. Decouplers, docking port, etc. There is a lot of intelligence to put in this game aspect, it's not hard (not speaking of dev here), it just need to be thought correctly, I guess.

I will state a simple, clear and concise opinion - @Nate Simpson @TriggerAu:

1. Get rid of the joint bending mechanic (remove the wobble / flexing from the game);
2. Implement a visual gauge system for joint stress so we have a clue when we are getting close to the vehicle breaking up / joint breaking under weight, aero-forces or acceleration;
3. Use the new found performance budget (from removing the visual joint bending) to implement a new physics-based system that makes flying rockets more interactive and provides control feedback to the player. First thing that comes to mind is dynamic aero-forces - namely wind.

Edited December 22, 2023 by Vl3d

[tstein]

10 minutes ago, Vl3d said:

I will state a simple, clear and concise opinion - @Nate Simpson @TriggerAu:

1. Get rid of the joint bending mechanic (remove the wobble / flexing from the game);
2. Implement a visual gauge system for joint stress so we have a clue when we are getting close to the vehicle breaking up / joint breaking under weight, aero-forces or acceleration;
3. Use the new found performance budget (from removing the visual joint bending) to implement a new physics-based system that makes flying rockets more interactive and provides control feedback to the player. First thing that comes to mind is dynamic aero-forces - namely wind.

The one thing I can say against the wind proposal is. wind,  with exception of hurricane level ones,  is a very weak force compared to the aerodynamic forces of a rocket plunging trough atmosphere at 800m/s, so might be a lot of work  for something that affect you only  at very  start of  ascent. IT coudl  on other hand be relevant on  descent, specially on  other planets with  dense atmosphere.

[Vl3d]

1 minute ago, tstein said:

The one thing I can say against the wind proposal is. wind,  with exception of hurricane level ones,  is a very weak force compared to the aerodynamic forces of a rocket plunging trough atmosphere at 800m/s, so might be a lot of work  for something that affect you only  at very  start of  ascent. IT coudl  on other hand be relevant on  descent, specially on  other planets with  dense atmosphere.

It depends on the force and how it changes as you ascent. Wind force is not constant - it can push with variable force by time. The main utility for rocket ascent would be to give that little bit of dynamic movement to the prograde vector so that SAS is not perfectly stable and there's more need for fine tuning by the player. A little bit of NavBall feedback really changes how flying a rocket feels. The main takeaway is using the performance budget gained from removing wobble for some other gameplay feature - preferably environmental.

As for descent or flying airplanes, sure, wind could have a bigger impact on the game - but that's a separate wind discussion, not a wobble discussion.

[Dakitess]

Yeah but... Planes !

I find landing in KSP way way way too easy regarding the challenge that it should be when it comes to shuttle, big massive SSTO, etc.

Some random wind would help mitigate that, as a togglable difficulty option if necessary  !

Though I would nuance and say that some wobble is still important, more than actually. Except if it implies to maintain a performance heavy system just for some light wobble than I can live without, I guess, to be replaced by something else more valuable indeed.

[Vl3d]

2 minutes ago, Dakitess said:

some wobble is still important, more than actually. Except if it implies to maintain a performance heavy system just for some light wobble than I can live without, I guess, to be replaced by something else more valuable indeed.

joint stress > joint flex