Spaceplanes Are Too Hard

[RoboRay]

The difficulty of spaceplanes is right where it should be. They are harder to design, and harder to fly than rockets. They are also smaller, lighter, and use far less fuel getting into space. When costs are a factor, a fully reusable and fuel sipping spaceplane will be a very desirable way to get personnel and light payloads into orbit.

As to the design challenge, consider the SPH to be "advanced mode" KSP. I struggled with SSTOs at first, too, but once you figure out the narrow tolerances for the various factors, they become about as easy to design as vertical rockets.

[bsalis]

I agree with RoboRay.

Having them harder means you have new challenges to move onto once your bored and done with rockets.

Besides, I'm not sure how they can be made much easier. The main challenges are around balance, and that is pretty fundamental.

[foamyesque]

I see a lot of people complaining that spaceplanes are hard to get to orbit. This is a myth; they're quite easy, even (or especially) as SSTOs:

The hard bit is landing.

[ROFLCopter64bit]

The hard bit is landing.

I cheat and use radial parachutes.

[chainedlupine]

The hard bit is landing.

Yeah, I don't call my SSTO design done until it can get back to KSC. (Or anywhere on the ground intact and fully at rest, at least.)

As for spaceplanes being hard -- I think they're non-intuitive to build due to the weird, simplified way that atmospheric drag and lift are modeled. But that will change when the new aerodynamics system is in place.

[BarryDennen12]

Spaceplanes were really easy before the update that took the oxidizer out of the spaceplane fuselages. Which is cool and all; makes it more challenging. I have to admit that I haven't had many spaceplane successes since then, but then I haven't really been spending much time playing the game.

[foamyesque]

I dunno. I run FAR these days (didn't when I built those guys) and my experience thus far is that whilst FAR is certainly more realistic it is also much, much more complicated.