How to decouple nodes and keep control from switching?

[Hour Hero Yes]

Hello, quick question here--

I often use a sort of Skycrane setup to drop vehicles or rovers onto the surface of a planet while hovering above it. Sometimes when I decouple the docking nodes, the control goes to the dropped lander and my skycrane loses control, as it becomes "unmanned". Is there a way to ensure that when I decouple a node, the focus stays on the ship I'm controlling?

[Geschosskopf]

The usual thing with sky cranes is that they fly off and crash after releasing the rover. So, usually the skycrane doesn't have a probe core, just the rover. You decouple and land the rover, keep it from rolling away, etc., ignoring the sky crane.

But it sounds like you want a reuseable skycrane. In that case, probably the easiest thing is to make it a lander. Fly it all the way down to a full-stop landing and decouple the rover while nothing is flying or moving. Switch control to the rover, set its parking brake so it will stay put, then switch back to the sky crane and fly it back up to wherever you want it to go.

[Hour Hero Yes]

I've definitely been able to drop the lander and keep the focus on the skycrane, though, which allows me to drop it while still hovering

[Dravin]

When decoupling make sure you are controlling from a control module, such as a probe core, on the crane and not on the rover. You can select a control module and tell the the game you want to control from that location.

[Skorpychan]

I set 'control from here' on the skycrane's probe core, and that works great for keeping focus on it.

Keeping control? Not so much. I was dropping a 6+ ton rover/base, so the skycrane just sort of shoots off upwards after the release due to the sudden lack of mass. Bad for control, great for making it GTFO and not land on the rover.

[strongest_2hu]

Just hit ] as soon as you decouple, the skycrane can't go far in the time that takes and it even tends to go in a useful direction, up.