Orbital warp limit and trip planner - how two "gameplay features" made me stupid

[Vl3d]

So, you know how in KSP 2 there's a limit to how fast you can time warp while in low-ish orbit? Well guess what - I thought the reason for it was that the devs wanted to help us play the game better. But no, let me explain...

Let's say I want to do a direct transfer to Jool. Because of the time warp limit in low orbit, in order to circumvent the limitation and not waste fuel circularizing in high orbit, for 150 hours, I've been (1) launching to LKO, (2) escaping Kerbin SOI and then orbiting Kerbol parallel to Kerbin and tine warping to get the correct encounter angle, after which (3) I do the transfer. Delta-V LKO -> Jool encounter.. ~3500 m/s. So I thought the devs were indirectly recommending we go to Kerbol orbit first, before time warping to a transfer window.

Do you see why I've been wasting my life for 150 hours?

Because if you burn directly from LKO (close to Kerbin) at the right time it only takes dV of 2400 m/s to get a Jool encounter.

So now I realize that not only burning at PE and on close approach is more efficient to raise the AP, but also burning while in low orbit of a CB is more efficient to raise the AP than burning when in orbit around Kerbol.

Which means that all along I should have time warped while landed.. and only launch at the correct transfer moment so I can burn to encounter from LKO.

FACE PALM.

The time warp speed limit in low orbit made me stupid. Also orbiting / landing on Gilly SUCKS for the same reason.

Later edit: it's also the trip planners fault, see below!

Edited December 30, 2023 by Vl3d

[EnderiumSmith]

They removed it from ksp1 for a reason

[18Watt]

I just go to the tracking station and warp til things look about right.

I just saw this graphic appear in the forums, which I thought was neat:

@Vl3d, I suspect you will not find many players who do not share your frustration with time warp limits.

[MechBFP]

52 minutes ago, 18Watt said:

I just go to the tracking station and warp til things look about right.

I just saw this graphic appear in the forums, which I thought was neat:

@Vl3d, I suspect you will not find many players who do not share your frustration with time warp limits.

If you are controlling a vehicle you first have to go to the KSC, then  go to the tracking station, otherwise the time warp multiplier will still be locked to low values. 

[HebaruSan]

On 12/28/2023 at 3:37 PM, Bej Kerman said:

It's ironic. This is the ONE feature I can say Squad got right, in that the game only cares about altitude as long as you're on a near-collision course. 

On 12/28/2023 at 6:06 PM, EnderiumSmith said:

They removed it from ksp1 for a reason

Whoa, I missed that change and thought we still needed BetterTimeWarp, but a quick trip to Minmus1.0 confirms the limit is gone! Do you remember what version of KSP1 dropped it? Maybe it was after the code was forked for KSP2 and they just haven't gotten around to considering it here yet.

BTW, upvote here to support having the same freedom-to-warp in the sequel:

Edited December 30, 2023 by HebaruSan

[Vl3d]

Hold on, the plot thickens! I managed to get a Dres encounter from Kerbin orbit for only 1600 m/s... but the Trip Planner said it would cost that PLUS the ~900 to escape Kerbin SOI. So actually I was using the Trip Planner logic to first escape Kerbin SOI and then burn. But burning near Kerbin saves me 900 m/s...

[Periple]

I am a bit surprised that you're only figure this stuff out now, you have been playing KSP1 a lot and this is all pretty elementary orbital mechanics!

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

8 hours ago, Vl3d said:

Hold on, the plot thickens! I managed to get a Dres encounter from Kerbin orbit for only 1600 m/s... but the Trip Planner said it would cost that PLUS the ~900 to escape Kerbin SOI. So actually I was using the Trip Planner logic to first escape Kerbin SOI and then burn. But burning near Kerbin saves me 900 m/s...

... You've always been supposed to burn near Kerbin to take advantage of the orbital velocity... 

[Vl3d]

I know, you're right, but both the Trip Planner and the orbital time warp speed limit imply that the way to do it is first to exit Kerbin SOI and then get / burn for an encounter. If the game tricked me, just think about what new players go through.

[Periple]

Did you do the tutorials?

[Mutex]

30 minutes ago, Vl3d said:

I know, you're right, but both the Trip Planner and the orbital time warp speed limit imply that the way to do it is first to exit Kerbin SOI and then get / burn for an encounter. If the game tricked me, just think about what new players go through.

That's interesting, because right now if you don't happen to know what phase angle you need for interplanetary transfer, and you don't use an online tool / mod, then this is pretty much the only way to actually go to another planet right now. I remember doing this in KSP1 when I'd just started playing it.

[Periple]

12 minutes ago, Mutex said:

That's interesting, because right now if you don't happen to know what phase angle you need for interplanetary transfer, and you don't use an online tool / mod, then this is pretty much the only way to actually go to another planet right now. I remember doing this in KSP1 when I'd just started playing it.

I would eyeball the An/Dn for the planets' orbits, then eject planetary prograde or retrograde (if I'm going outward or inward), with enough burn to get the orbits to touch. Then I'd plan a burn at the Pe/Ap and keep clicking the "next orbit" button until I got a cheap encounter. It could take years but it worked!

[regex]

The time warp limit being removed must be in very new versions of KSP1, I don't remember that. Back in the day I'd often launch a satellite into high orbit that I could use for heavy time warp to avoid the scene change to the Tracking Station (not sure how much more efficient that was vOv). That might actually be a good way to do it in KSP2 because apparently just going to the tracking station retains the current time warp limit, you can just switch craft.

4 hours ago, Periple said:

Did you do the tutorials?

Do they have tutorials for transferring to another planet? Apparently not, I just looked. Back in the day when we didn't have tutorials knowledge just got passed around the forums and you'd learn that way. I think we're way past that initial point and doing a Hohmann is just ... second nature so no one's really talking about how to do it correctly.

KSP2 also kept one of the best QOL features from KSP1: the ability to move the maneuver node along the orbit. See, before they added that feature you had to plop down a node and hope it was in the correct spot. The entire reason I wrote (more properly salvaged and rewrote) PreciseNode back in the day was to give myself the ability to change the time of the maneuver and also see the ejection angle of the node. That allowed me to use tools like Alex Moon's Transfer Planner or KSP TOT.

These days, even with the time warp limits, creating a transfer is quite easy. You can just slap down a node by eyeball, add enough delta-V to feel good about it, drag it along the orbit to get a better ejection angle, and then fine-tune as needed.

13 hours ago, Vl3d said:

Hold on, the plot thickens! I managed to get a Dres encounter from Kerbin orbit for only 1600 m/s... but the Trip Planner said it would cost that PLUS the ~900 to escape Kerbin SOI. So actually I was using the Trip Planner logic to first escape Kerbin SOI and then burn. But burning near Kerbin saves me 900 m/s...

That entirely depends on the timeframe for when you do a transfer. Check out the Launch Window Planner, you'll notice if you set the earliest departure time to year 1, day 1 the best transfer you can get will be 2442m/s. Now set the earliest departure to year 4, day 1 and see that you can do it for 1609m/s. Fast forward another three years to year 7, day 1 and you can do it for 1541m/s. And finally, in year 11 it goes up to 1974m/s.

The trip planner is giving you your best chance of making the transfer no matter when you go. This is why dedicated programmatic tools will always be better than a simple subway map (what the trip planner actually is).

Edited December 30, 2023 by regex

[EvelynThe Dragon]

14 hours ago, Vl3d said:

Hold on, the plot thickens! I managed to get a Dres encounter from Kerbin orbit for only 1600 m/s... but the Trip Planner said it would cost that PLUS the ~900 to escape Kerbin SOI. So actually I was using the Trip Planner logic to first escape Kerbin SOI and then burn. But burning near Kerbin saves me 900 m/s...

The trip planner is extremely broken and stupid. It makes the return values on a round trip the same as outbound values, and anyone who has played KSP1 for any length of time knows that is nonsense. It doesn't give  a lot of information you might need and it has no options for including or excluding landing and ascent for other bodies. Nor does it allow for figuring the minimum energy trajectory or aerobraking. It's a very dumb tool.

IMO it's a useless tool. It leads to stupid over design for much more Delta V than is necessary, especially for things like a Mun or Minmus mission.

[Pthigrivi]

On 12/30/2023 at 2:23 PM, EvelynThe Dragon said:

The trip planner is extremely broken and stupid. It makes the return values on a round trip the same as outbound values, and anyone who has played KSP1 for any length of time knows that is nonsense. It doesn't give  a lot of information you might need and it has no options for including or excluding landing and ascent for other bodies. Nor does it allow for figuring the minimum energy trajectory or aerobraking. It's a very dumb tool.

IMO it's a useless tool. It leads to stupid over design for much more Delta V than is necessary, especially for things like a Mun or Minmus mission.

I don't think it's useless. It still has the values and its nice we don't have to switch to a browser (or the print I have on the wall  I fully agree the tool is incomplete though, and should allow us to click through and add and subtract and mute legs. This is really the story of this whole thread: the game just isn't done yet. It definitely needs a transfer window calculator and alarm clock. 

[feradose.]

The Oberth effect and its consequences have been a triumph for the Kerbal race.