Why do large ships have such bad performance?

[KspNoobUsernameTaken]

I was wondering what the technical reason for performance getting worse with large vessels is. In atmosphere, it makes sense, but rendering and physics in space shouldn't be that performance intensive, right? So any specific reason for this?

[DeadJohn]

Physics in space has to do a lot despite no atmosphere. Each connection between parts still has to be checked for wobble. Temperature transfer between parts still needs to be calculated. Etc.

 

[KspNoobUsernameTaken]

5 hours ago, DeadJohn said:

Physics in space has to do a lot despite no atmosphere. Each connection between parts still has to be checked for wobble. Temperature transfer between parts still needs to be calculated. Etc.

 

Makes sense to me! It's a shame though, KSP would be an even better game if this was optimized well.