Parts, their sizes and the badly-arranged Part UI

[iZen]

Hi,

I noticed that the part system as it is now is somewhat cumbersome. You got like a dozen different cylinders with fuel in it, for example.

It makes searching for the right barrel really annoying. Also in the aerodynamics section the different wing types are hard to differentiate.

Another thing is that for example all the side-mounted fuel tanks are monoprop only.

How about that: You cut down the number of those items that are very similar.

So you got the short, the medium and the long barrel and make them scalable in diameter.

So lets say you click the long fuel tank, a popup opens up, there you can select diameter and contents: Empty, Monoprop, Biprop, JetFuel

Scalability works for almost every items.

This also goes for rover wheels, adapters, stack modules etc.

Furthermore, all the items that are unique (in size) like say the different modular girders or the wings will be available in many more sizes, thus multiplying the amount of possible playercreations.

I for example like those swept wings very much, but they are only usable for rather small planes. Or I want to side-mount my favourite fuel somewhere, but they all are filled with monoprop.

My system brings the following benefits:

Making the part menu vastly more accessible and well-arranged.

At the same time, increases the total amount of parts by a LOT.

Limitations like wing size or fuel contents make stock-only players (like me) somewhat frustrated.

Others will modify the parts or use modded ones, therefore even more obstructing their UI's.

And about execution, its not really a big deal. For most items you wouldnt need to make "scalable items", but just rearrange the ones already existing into my system. The unique parts would require the scaling system. But even if they were done in the different sizes manually, it would not be too much work for a single person and would seriously pay off.

[Captain Sierra]

You are talking about tweakables and procedural parts. The former is planned but not for a while. The latter is not planned for the stock game as the community is way too divided on it. I personally love procedural parts but I like having a choice. There are plans for better organization and part sorting in the parts menu already, they just haven't come yet. With the massive part load expected to come from .22, you can probably expect some part menu organization work done by next update.

[Wallace]

What annoys me is, mono-propellant tanks are in propulsion, and RCS schnozzles are in control. I feel they should be together, and as control is super empty and propulsion is too crowded it would help a lot finding parts quicker.

[AngelLestat]

For that reason there is a Procedural parts topic discussion open. There are example tables too, maybe they reflect exactly what you think.

[DMagic]

What annoys me is, mono-propellant tanks are in propulsion, and RCS schnozzles are in control. I feel they should be together, and as control is super empty and propulsion is too crowded it would help a lot finding parts quicker.

I agree with this. Engines and fuel are already in a section together, so why shouldn't RCS thrusters and mono fuel be in a section together. That's a good point about how few parts are in the control tab, too.

[FellipeC]

There is a mod called Part Catalog that helps a lot with this.

But I think in the vanilla game we could have subcategories for the parts, for example, in Propulsion, we could have buttons to fuel, engines and srbs, in control for RCS and SAS, in Structural buttons for stack separators, radial separators, and so on...

[JimmyAgent007]

I think Mono should be in control as well but id also like to see the most often used parts float to the top of the list.

[Kegereneku]

If it give any inspiration here is how I would see the Part catalog.

If the part is -usually- for 1m diameter --> (1) on the icon

If the part is for 2m diameter --> (2)

Else no symbol

Compatible or interdependent parts would share a color. (ex : liquid-fuel (blue) solid-fuel (red) nuclear (yellow)...etc)

*** PROPULSION TAB ***

<Fuel Tank>

- Xenon tank with another icon color

- No RCS here unless there's mono-propellant "main engine"

<Rocket engine>

- Include Solid-booster, Xenon Engine & Nuclear Engine with different icon color

*** CONTROL TAB ***

<Attitude control system> (include RCS-thruster And mono-tank)

Those wouldn't change much

<Aerodynamic> would include Jet-intake & Jet-engine-nozzle

<Structural> would include landing gear.

*** PROPULSION TAB ***

<Electric Generation> for Generator & Storage system only

<Miscellaneous> or subcategory for anything else

*** MISSION TAB ***

<SCIENCE>

<Resources> or the full acronym of ISRU

<Core> for parent-node parts

[Captain Sierra]

I think Mono should be in control as well but id also like to see the most often used parts float to the top of the list.

Until there are monopropellant engines (I reference RLA Stockalike), I agree. When there are stock monoprop engines, then I'll say you're wrong.