Alternatives to Ferram for realistic drag models?

[NathanKell]

I really wouldn't call it a consensus.

Consensus of a faction, sure, but not of all of us.

[Sean Mirrsen]

Lowered Isp reduces engine efficiency on all counts of engine usage. Even supposing you don't decrease engine efficiency in space to account for the fact that FAR changes nothing in space, you are still changing performance of engines used for things other than tearing ridiculously fast through the atmosphere. It has more to do with the concept of FAR. FAR, by itself, does nothing to engines, only changing the aerodynamic interactions of parts. So, to use a convoluted simile, if you're freezing because your air conditioner is set too cold, you should really readjust it rather than turning on a heater. Cutting down engine efficiency because the air suddenly became too forgiving is rather looking for solutions in the wrong place.

As for the "vertical climb". Like I said, experimentation is needed to pinpoint the exact changes required so that the result feels as "right" as possible. Using an "ideal" FAR rocket as a baseline would probably not be good, since if you want to reward good design, you should make it so that an "ideal" rocket flies better in FAR than in stock, but at the same time worse builds must fly worse - than those same builds in stock, not just the ideal rocket. FAR, right now, introduces realism blindly. It would, in my opinion, blend with KSP much better if it took the game's stock gameplay into account, and actually looked to augment it - punishing bad designs and rewarding good ones. It does do this right now, but on its own, within its own frame - barring extra control requirements you can take pretty much any station lifter and it'll fly up as well in FAR as it does stock, without so much as a Dynamic Fairing. It will do better with a fairing, but it won't do worse than it does stock, which in my opinion would need to be the whole point of introducing "realism" to KSP's aerodynamics. So in short, we do have to choose a baseline, but it should not be "ideal". The baseline would probably still need to get out of the thick of atmosphere before starting the turn. A better-built rocket might not have to.

[NathanKell]

but at the same time worse builds must fly worse

You keep not answering WHY that's true, other than "because I wants it to be!!!"

Tastes differ.

And no, any old rocket won't do better--it might well flip out and crash, unless you're a very good pilot. And if you change the drag, then that's heightened, as ferram has said a number of times.

[Sean Mirrsen]

Isn't that... I don't know, the whole point of adding realism to aerodynamics? Adding aerodynamics, period? Good design flies good, bad design flies bad? That's already true in FAR as it is now. All that's left is taking FAR's range of bad to good, pick a middle point, and stick it right over the spot that stock KSP "aerodynamics" occupies. I don't know how to put it in simpler or better understandable terms.

[Hodo]

FAR significantly reduces delta-v requirements (and thereby fuel requirements, and launch vehicle mass) for atmospheric ascent (by some 30%). That makes it easier. How much easier could it get before being to easy?

FAR would also be working if it would cause an aerodynamically unfit rocket (the sort that is typical for non-FAR KSP; build wide, not necessarily with fairings, nose cones etc) to require more delta-v to reach LKO than it does with the stock drag model. Imo FAR should - relative to the stock drag model - 'punish' when you do it wrong, not make it easier when you do it right. Doing it right would of course still make it easier wrt fuel requirements, than doing it wrong.

I'd think it would require little more than adjusting either an atmospheric density constant or a surface friction constant.

Can't say I have experienced this. But my first rockets were with FAR+DRE+Thrust Corrector.

Now that I don't have the Thrust Corrector I still build many of my space planes (SSTOs) and rockets the same way. My HV-1 rocket which is what I consider a heavy lift rocket that can move 60-90 tons into orbit has 5 orange tanks, 1 X-8 as a heat sink for the Mainsail, and 4 of the 650 thrust engines. It is assisted off the pad by 4 SRBs which burn out at about 3km or so. Is it perfect, no, but I have only recently got into the building rockets, as the past 400 hours of game time I built space planes.

Of which I have several that can get to space hauling 70+ ton cargo loads without any of the problems Tiron listed. I personally can't stand those monster 12+ orange tank monsters that spread out across the launch pad like a badly made flan. I also don't have some automagical autopilot program do all my work for me. The FAR drag model currently isn't perfect, but it IS far better that the stock KSP model, which there isn't one. If people are having problems controlling their rockets when performing gravity turns, well then they should perhaps what a NASA rocket launch, or even a Russian rocket launch. Both of them throttle back the boosters before performing the turn, they do it slow and deliberate. When the turn is complete they throttle the booster back up and then let it go the rest of the way. If I get over zealous and I punch the turn to hard, and turn faster than 5-10deg more than my direction of flight indicator, I will flip the rocket around and possibly blow it apart. I begin my turn around 8km and often finish it around 11km. If someone doesn't have the patience for that then perhaps they should avoid FAR.

[NathanKell]

Yeah, my rule of thumb is start the turn at 100m/s and go 1dps or less until level. Never had to throttle down, though.

Isn't that... I don't know, the whole point of adding realism to aerodynamics?

Yes. That's why the dV is the way it is. You're talking about then removing the realism again, in the service of "I want it to cost more dV to get to orbit."

[Sean Mirrsen]

Yes. That's why the dV is the way it is. You're talking about then removing the realism again, in the service of "I want it to cost more dV to get to orbit."

Correction. I want to displace Earth-universe realism in the service of "I want FAR to be KSP with improvements". Kerbin, by its very dark-matter-comprised nature, is not realistic. By using realistic aerodynamics in an atmosphere a tenth as thick as it's supposed to be, FAR is making launches that are already easy, unrealistically easy.

I... really don't know how to put what I'd like to see in better words. Maybe a picture? Here, I'll treat you to the kind of artistic prowess I am only capable of when not using my Intuos: KSP vs FAR illustrated chart.

I want realism and complexity, but as long as that doesn't make the game easier across the board, darnit. Yes I know spaceplanes are harder. Yes I know supersonic control issues. But the new atmosphere is just a little too thin.

[Hodo]

Correction. I want to displace Earth-universe realism in the service of "I want FAR to be KSP with improvements". Kerbin, by its very dark-matter-comprised nature, is not realistic. By using realistic aerodynamics in an atmosphere a tenth as thick as it's supposed to be, FAR is making launches that are already easy, unrealistically easy.

I... really don't know how to put what I'd like to see in better words. Maybe a picture? Here, I'll treat you to the kind of artistic prowess I am only capable of when not using my Intuos: KSP vs FAR illustrated chart.

I want realism and complexity, but as long as that doesn't make the game easier across the board, darnit. Yes I know spaceplanes are harder. Yes I know supersonic control issues. But the new atmosphere is just a little too thin.

Maybe its early, maybe I didn't get enough sleep but I am trying to make sense of your artwork. So the left rendering is a stock KSP rocket, the far right is the FAR aerodynamic rocket, the middle is what you want?

All of my rockets already look like the one on the right.

[Sean Mirrsen]

No, the three are basically the extreme ends of the "unaerodynamic" versus "aerodynamic" rocket shapes scale, with a kind of a middle ground inbetween. The "middle ground", whatever it ends up being, should probably be what the FAR/Stock dichotomy should be balanced against - with both room to improve, and capacity for worse design.

I basically suck at making recognizable charts, is probably the thing to take away from this.

Edited October 18, 2013 by Sean Mirrsen

[Camacha]

I want realism and complexity, but as long as that doesn't make the game easier across the board, darnit. Yes I know spaceplanes are harder. Yes I know supersonic control issues. But the new atmosphere is just a little too thin.

I think the whole issue here is that you mistakenly think the game is easier across the board with FAR. Go and have a look in the FAR topic. There are plenty issues to be found that are the result of poor design - design that would be poor in the real world. Rockets with the wrong weight distribution, with the wrong aerodynamics (yes, rockets without nosecones are known to be hard to control) and more stuff like that These are all issues that arose when people tried to applied the broken stock physics to the more real world like FAR physics. Maybe you are a natural born genious rocket scientist, but with FAR it is necessary to work with some(what) proper designs.

As Ferram4 has stated before; pretty much any brick will get to orbit with enough rocket power strapped to it. That is also true for the real world, but since we are limited by funding and common sense there that just does not happen. That does not mean real world physics are broken

Outside of that I feel that you are asking for some very personal desires to be implemented in FAR. As some other people stated before, I think it is up to you to learn to mod and make those changes happen yourself. Maybe it will catch on.

[Camacha]

No, the three are basically the extreme ends of the "unaerodynamic" versus "aerodynamic" rocket shapes scale, with a kind of a middle ground inbetween. The "middle ground", whatever it ends up being, should probably be what the FAR/Stock dichotomy should be balanced against - with both room to improve, and capacity for worse design.

I do not understand the usefulness of using a general middle ground rocket as baseline when that baseline is (also) entirely arbitrary and does not guarantee that the scale above or below the middle ground is balanced, fair or realistic.

[Sean Mirrsen]

It does not guarantee that at all. But it's a closer mark than FAR itself is. And I don't want FAR to be altered for everyone. I want to be able to tune it - preferably without rooting through the whole of its config file, manually multiplying coefficients. Plus of course I'm trying to promote my own viewpoint, because it is much easier for an idea to get traction if more than one person agrees with it.

The troubles people have with FAR stem mostly from control, or at least that's what I would expect given my experience with it. I mean strictly rockets here, spaceplanes are a whole different kettle of fish with FAR. The changes FAR makes to control surface effectiveness and rocket stability at high velocities make rockets harder to steer, large ones especially. But once you adapt to make the rocket steer well and learn how to avoid the pitfalls of the new system, the aerodynamics aren't nearly as harsh as they could be.

Maybe I just adapt too quickly to the challenge, who knows. But I don't find the control difficulty a sufficient tradeoff for the reduced air resistance - as I said, even for bad designs.

One of these days I'm going to reinstall FAR and perform some actual science on this. Probably around the same time I unlock all of the tech tree in Career. I'll be back with the experimental data then.

[Camacha]

It does not guarantee that at all. But it's a closer mark than FAR itself is.

I guess we could say that you personally feel it would be. Like I said, it seems totally arbitrary and I do not see a lot of reason to replace one (according to you) arbitrary system with another, besides it being closer to some (personal) ideal you see.

If you really feel everything is too easy there is a solution for it now too in the form of ISP adjustment, but somehow that is not good enough for you either. Again, if what you want is that specific, you should really consider picking up modding yourself. The two mods together do a lot to improve the difficulty towards reality without resorting to soupy atmospheres (as we do not have on Earth).

But once you adapt to make the rocket steer well and learn how to avoid the pitfalls of the new system, the aerodynamics aren't nearly as harsh as they could be.

So you are saying that once you master certain problems, they are not hard? Is that not the point of learning anything?

Edited October 18, 2013 by Camacha

[ymir9]

If you run FAR with Deadly Reentry 2, that same SRB rocket will crush itself under the g-loads. I find SRB rockets incredibly difficult to manage with Deadly Reentry because the TWR is just too high.

[Sean Mirrsen]

If you run FAR with Deadly Reentry 2, that same SRB rocket will crush itself under the g-loads. I find SRB rockets incredibly difficult to manage with Deadly Reentry because the TWR is just too high.

Hmm, now that might be worth looking into. Thanks.

I'll still do that experimental testing thing later on, to get some proper numberage on the differences in difficulty between FAR and KSP Stock. Right now it seems this discussion can't progress further without that data, since general ideas seem to be hitting a brick wall.

[Nobody_1707]

I'd argue that Stock KSP does not have a aerodynamic drag model, period.

Well that would be a hard argument to refute, because stock KSP definitely does not have an aerodynamic drag model.

Clearly, Sean Mirrsen is more interested in verisimilitude than realism, which is fine, but he's confusing the issue by referring to his desires as "realistic." Also, doesn't Ferram's ISP scaler already have a FAR to KSP preset? That basically accomplishes what he's asking for right? Kerbal-X gets into orbit with roughly the same amount of fuel?

[Sean Mirrsen]

Clearly, Sean Mirrsen is more interested in verisimilitude than realism, which is fine, but he's confusing the issue by referring to his desires as "realistic."

Hmm... no, I don't. I literally went through every post of mine on this topic just now to make sure I haven't said anything that can be misconstrued as such, and no I am not referring to my desires as "realistic" by any stretch of margin. FAR attempts to be realistic. KSP is set in an unrealistic universe. Together this results in complexity, which is good, but too much of a decrease in difficulty where that complexity doesn't show as much, or is easily overcome.

(I have, for the record, just reinstalled FAR to see what actually changed since I last played with it. Jeb's expression says it all. Clearly I need to get used to building these things again. )

Also, doesn't Ferram's ISP scaler already have a FAR to KSP preset? That basically accomplishes what he's asking for right? Kerbal-X gets into orbit with roughly the same amount of fuel?

It does accomplish a change in difficulty, but I feel it does this from the wrong end. FAR is about the atmosphere and aerodynamics. It has no business adjusting engine parameters (and I mean to take FAR and KIDS as one mod in this case, as they're by the same author), especially not if doing so affects things not otherwise affected by FAR - like VTOL craft on oxygenless planets, that need to hover without jets.

And indeed, I aim for verisimilitude over realism, in the same way KSP itself aims for it. Accurately realistic mechanics are good, complexity is good, but it's also good to remember what kind of game we're playing here.

[SFJackBauer]

I don't even remember how I found this thread... but reading it made me want to download and use FAR immediately.

Immediately.

[Starwaster]

Then why are half the posts in the FAR thread people complaining about it making the game too hard?

FAR kicked my puppy and stole my launch money!!!

[Camacha]

FAR kicked my puppy and stole my launch money!!!

I am guessing your puppy did not have a proper fairing. That is just asking for trouble.