What does the green marker on your navball do?

[alexdr5398]

I've noticed that the rocket is attracted to it. In tutorial videos, the marker doesnt move but on mine it does, even though I've made the exact same ship. Help please

[Lone K.]

The green marker that you speak of is your Retrograde node. This is the node that points out where you should burn (fire your rockets) towards in order to decrease your velocity (your speed and direction). The yellow node is the Prograde node, which points out what direction you should fire your rockets towards to increase your velocity.

Your node is probably moving because you're accelerating in a different direction rather than 'up' or 'down'. Depending on which side it moves to, if it's the retrograde node, then that is the direction opposite of your current velocity. Hope this helped!

Just to note: the blue hemisphere of the navball points in the direction of 'up'. The orange hemisphere of the navball is in the direction of 'down'. If your retrograde node is in the center of the orange side, then you're moving upwards, and vise versa with the blue side. When the nodes move to the equatorial line of the navball (the center line between the hemispheres), then you're moving horizontally.

If this sounds too complicated, here's an image that was not made by me to help you:

Edited October 1, 2013 by Lone K.

[Nasakev]

Here are some of the things that can be on your navball.

http://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/wiki/Navball#Gallery

There are two green markers on your navball: prograde and retrograde.

-Prograde is the direction your ship is heading.

-Retrograde is the opposite of prograde- it's where your ship is coming from.

In the tutorial you start out in orbit. This means your prograde marker is pointing down the orbital path. If you watch it over time, it actually does move- just slowly, as orbits take a long time.

Once you understand how the navball works you're halfway to being a space pilot- it's one of the fundamental tools of KSP spaceflight. Good luck!

Btw, if you post some pictures of your rocket we can help you a bit more.

[Kasuha]

I found it a good idea - at least at the start - to not try to make connection between what you see on navball and what you see in 3D view. 3D view is deceiving.

[-Velocity-]

Here are some of the things that can be on your navball.

http://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/wiki/Navball#Gallery

There are two green markers on your navball: prograde and retrograde.

-Prograde is the direction your ship is heading.

-Retrograde is the opposite of prograde- it's where your ship is coming from.

In the tutorial you start out in orbit. This means your prograde marker is pointing down the orbital path. If you watch it over time, it actually does move- just slowly, as orbits take a long time.

Once you understand how the navball works you're halfway to being a space pilot- it's one of the fundamental tools of KSP spaceflight. Good luck!

Btw, if you post some pictures of your rocket we can help you a bit more.

The thing that gave me the most hell as a noob with the nav ball is that the keyboard controls are inverted. "a" yaws you left, "d" yaws you right, "q" rolls you left, "e" rolls you right... but for some ASININE reason, "w" pitches you DOWN and "s" pitches you up. Once I flipped these controls so that pressing the down key ("s") made my nose go down and pressing the up key ("w") made my nose go up, I was able to fly 300% better. I was also able to dock once I stayed in staging mode and realized that the translate up and translate down were also inverted... you press down ("k") to go up and press up ("i") to go down. That's just messed up.

Yes, I fly flight sims, and I'm aware that pitching a joystick forward makes your nose go down. But that is a joystick, and a different mind set. With a keyboard, we're effectively striking "arrow" keys, so what translates to the "up arrow" should **not** make your nose go down. And you can't even make the joystick excuse with actual 3D translation; there is not even an excuse I can think of at all to make the up key physically translate your spacecraft down, and vice-versa.

So yea, the very first thing I would advise a noob to do would be to go into the staging controls and flip the assignments of "w" and "s", and "i" and "k".

Edited October 1, 2013 by |Velocity|

[TMS]

The thing that gave me the most hell as a noob with the nav ball is that the keyboard controls are inverted. "a" yaws you left, "d" yaws you right, "q" rolls you left, "e" rolls you right... but for some ASININE reason, "w" pitches you DOWN and "s" pitches you up.

That's almost a universally-used standard in flight sims, but it's not one that is universally intuitive.

It's why most games with no keymap ability offer the ability to invert axes.

[Millie]

If you put your fingers on all four keys and then make "nyooooowwwwwwm" noises with your hand while swooping left, right, forward and backward, the "w pitches down" thing makes perfect sense.

I encourage all people to do it. Especially when they have company.

[-Velocity-]

That's almost a universally-used standard in flight sims, but it's not one that is universally intuitive.

It's why most games with no keymap ability offer the ability to invert axes.

Actually, I'm not quite so sure about that being a standard in flight sims. I'm pretty sure I remember that in Falcon 4, the up arrow on the keyboard would pitch the aircraft up. I never flew DCS via a keyboard, so I couldn't tell you how that worked.

I do know that in both DCS and Falcon 4 though, TRIM worked that way- up would trim you down, and vice versa, and I had to change it. But as far as actual pitch up and pitch down... I don't think it's a "universal standard" as you say, but I could be wrong, since I almost always flew by joystick.

Anyway, this sort of reminds me of