[1.12] Extraplanetary Launchpads v6.99.3

[taniwha]

@ss8913: thanks for the feedback. I agree that example use cases for the stake types would be beneficial.

And yeah, I'll hanging out for FAR, too. Stock still feels cheaty at times (and underpowered at others), though nowhere near what it was.

[Shadriss]

Potential new user here, but am wishing for a quick writeup on exactly how this works. The link on the OP for the short tutorial does not work any longer. Any chance of getting something up to help out?

[goldenpsp]

1 hour ago, Shadriss said:

Potential new user here, but am wishing for a quick writeup on exactly how this works. The link on the OP for the short tutorial does not work any longer. Any chance of getting something up to help out?

Search YouTube?

[Shadriss]

Vids are all well and good, but I much prefer a written version by, if possible, the guy/people who created a thing so as to remove any possibility of misunderstanding, miscommunication, etc. Also, it's far easier to print out a tutorial and refer to it while playing than to flip back and forth between a video and the game. Your simplistic two-word answer is appreciated, but not the solution I was looking for.

Edited October 29, 2016 by Shadriss

[goldenpsp]

2 hours ago, Shadriss said:

Potential new user here, but am wishing for a quick writeup on exactly how this works. The link on the OP for the short tutorial does not work any longer. Any chance of getting something up to help out?

Well you could also look at the manual that comes with the mod.  It's the PDF file with the word manual in it.  

[taniwha]

And be sure to give feedback on any areas that are lacking. It is a WIP after all.

[Fendrin]

@Shadriss has a point there, all the URL in the OP's first paragraph are down.

[Shadriss]

2 hours ago, Fendrin said:

@Shadriss has a point there, all the URL in the OP's first paragraph are down.

And honestly, this was the main point.

[taniwha]

3 hours ago, Shadriss said:

And honestly, this was the main point.

Coulda said so in the first place

I'll see if I can fix the links.

[Agnemon]

Houston, we have a problem !

 

 I can't build with stakes, when I bring up the EL screen (when building from the Survey station) I get a single line of text along the top and this error message

"NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object"

 

Range to stake 50 meters

Kerbal is a 2 star (90% courage, 36% Stupid)

 

Link to Log file : https://www.dropbox.com/s/xixibgwqtpp06py/KSP.log?dl=0

Link to Screenshot : https://www.dropbox.com/s/jyncw022n36z00w/screenshot0.png?dl=0

 

One day I'll figure out how to post images directly

Mods:

Blitzzys Toolbar  1.7.13

B9 Part Switch

Chatterer  0.9.91

Community Category Kit

Community Resource Pack

Editor Extensions Redux  3.3.3

EVA Transfer  5.0

EL 5.5.2

Glass Things 

Interstellar Fuel Switch  2.2.6

KAS  0.6.0

Kerbal Hacks (Ashpalt Tiles)  1.2

Kerbal Stats 2.10

KIS  1.3.0

MechJeb 2 2.5.9.0-645

Mod Rocket System 1.13.1

Near Future Electrical 0.8.1

Planetary Base Inc 1.3.2

Portrait Stats 12.0

RCS Build Aid 0.9

Repo Soft Tech (AMP Year) 1.4.2.0

Scan Sat 16.10

Trigger Tech (Kerbal Alarm Clock)

Tweakscale 2.3.1

Ubio Welding Ltd 2.3.4

 

This is a 3 or 4 day old fresh install, was having the same problems so reinstalled everything. Made no difference

 

Agnemon

[taniwha]

KerbalStats is not yet updated for 1.2: it won't work. However, this should not be the cause of the problem. I do expect to have it ready soon, though.

I'm not sure what's going on with the actual problem, but for now try disabling the highlighting (little toggle button in the upper right of the build window) and see if it makes any difference as most of the exceptions come from that.

[Shadriss]

16 hours ago, taniwha said:

Coulda said so in the first place

 

On 10/29/2016 at 1:03 PM, Shadriss said:

...The link on the OP for the short tutorial does not work any longer...

Uhm... I did? Regardless, looking forward to trying this out - should get rid of the one problem I've been trying to tackle in KSP, if I understand this right.

[Palec]

Hello, I would need a bit of advice. I'm trying to build a rover with EL, but I don't have launchpad on my vessel as I saw on few youtube videos that I can use Survey Stake. But when I use them (deployed them using mallet outside of base), I cannot click on EL build icon in toolbar to open build menu. This menu is accessible only when I have launchpad or runway on my vessel.

Is this intentional or bug? Thanks for help

[Johnny Appleseed]

@Palec you need a crewed EL Survey Station to use the Survey Stakes.

[DStaal]

1 hour ago, Palec said:

Hello, I would need a bit of advice. I'm trying to build a rover with EL, but I don't have launchpad on my vessel as I saw on few youtube videos that I can use Survey Stake. But when I use them (deployed them using mallet outside of base), I cannot click on EL build icon in toolbar to open build menu. This menu is accessible only when I have launchpad or runway on my vessel.

Is this intentional or bug? Thanks for help

Do you have a Survey Station nearby?  That's what you need to click on, then it should allow you to choose which stake (or set of identically-named stakes) to build at.

[taniwha]

16 hours ago, Johnny Appleseed said:

 you need a crewed EL Survey Station to use the Survey Stakes.

Partly true. Uncrewed has a pretty short range (20m), crewed by non-surveyors is a bit better at 50m, but surveyors (pilots by default) take the range out depending their on level: 100m, 200m, 400m, 800m, 1600m, 2000m.

[ss8913]

On 10/29/2016 at 10:03 AM, Shadriss said:

Potential new user here, but am wishing for a quick writeup on exactly how this works. The link on the OP for the short tutorial does not work any longer. Any chance of getting something up to help out?

This is very basic, very scaled down, and only addresses one of the EPL use cases, but here we go...

1. install EPL
2. install MKS (you can use EPL without it, but I don't, and I'm writing the post here... main diff is that MKS overrides some of the resources used for building)
3. install KAS and KIS.  This step is 100% required

ok, now that you've got that done; go into VAB and design a sweet base using all the kolonization tools that MKS gives you.  Whole base.  No piece by piece, no skycranes, don't put any engines or RCS on any of it, you don't need it.  Put some KAS CC connector ports on it for pumping stuff into it later.  The EPL build utility window will show you how many MaterialKits and SpecializedParts you need to build this thing.  Write those numbers down.

now build a ship that has Kontainers sufficient to hold the required numbers of each resource from the previous step.  Make sure it also has an EL Survey Station.  Put your two best PILOTS in the survey station and maybe 4-5 well-trained engineers somewhere else in the craft.  Make sure that at least one of the engineer-occupied seats has a seat inventory including a mallet and about 4 survey stakes.

Fly this thing somewhere.  Minmus is easiest since the flats are... flat.

Take your engineer out with the mallet and drive the 4 stakes into the ground in a roughly square pattern.  For best results, set the stake modes to "Y-" (right-click menu) if the ground isn't completely flat.  If you're on minmus you can skip this.  He can now get back into the nice warm ship.

Push the EPL button on the toolbar.  Pick VAB, pick your sweet base, and click Build.  When it's done, click Finalize.  Out pops a fully finished base in the area denoted by the stakes.

Great, right?  Almost; there's no EC or food or water or anything in the base, it is cold, dark, and empty (always is when you build with survey stakes).  This is why I said put some CC connector ports on the thing.  You may need to send a second ship here to pump all the stuff in, charge the batteries, and staff it.  Unless your construction craft is capable of carrying all of that stuff and has some CC connector ports on it as well so that you can hook it up post-build and transfer it all.

 

This is what I primarily use EPL for, and have done so successfully through many versions of this mod.  Building a complex base with a single launch and no skycranes and frustrating ground-docking maneuvers is exactly what I always wanted, and EPL delivers.
 

[Shadriss]

Appreciate the explanation as it pertains to your build. I note that you list KIS/KAS as required for how you do things, and I can understand why you did. I've tried that mod in the past, and was never able to figure it out either. Maybe I'm dense. Maybe I've never gotten to a stage in the game where I would be able to make use of it. But no matter the cause, I wasn't able to make much use of it.

All that notwithstanding, I think I got what I needed there. Mostly, anyhow. The specific situation I was looking to address is a situation where I want to have a 'shipyard' in orbit, and build and launch larger craft from there as opposed to somehow building them in orbit on site. How would the process you outlined above differ to accomplish this kind of tasking, as opposed to a surface base?

[Agnemon]

On 31/10/2016 at 5:44 AM, taniwha said:

KerbalStats is not yet updated for 1.2: it won't work. However, this should not be the cause of the problem. I do expect to have it ready soon, though.

I'm not sure what's going on with the actual problem, but for now try disabling the highlighting (little toggle button in the upper right of the build window) and see if it makes any difference as most of the exceptions come from that.

Ok, that was the problem (KerbalStats that is, not the highlighting)

But I am having an issue with the range that the Survey Station sees the stake, it has to be within 50 meters even with a 2 star pilot inside (it could be the new instant level upgrade option, Don't think those Kerbals have been back to Kerbin)

I also see that the blue workshop produces rocket parts even with no kerbals in the ship, let alone in the workshop. Is this intended?

 

Agnemon

[aluc24]

@taniwha , I just tried it out, great addon! But I am also using Kerbal Construction Time, which also makes you wait until craft is built (as opposed to the insta-build in vanilla). KCT and EPL would work great together. The problem is, they are not balanced. EPL build times seem to be very fast. Craft that takes weeks to be built on Kerbin takes just hours on barely manned station with EPL.

I talked with creator of KCT, and he said that if EPL had some configuration options that affect build times and maybe some API hooks, these two wonderful addons would work very nicely together. Do you think you could add configuration/preset options that would allow balancing between EPL and KCT?

Hope I'm not asking too much... Again, great addon!

[taniwha]

I believe EL's build times are fairly realistic, at least for structural stuff, as they the represent assembly of pre-made parts (hence "RocketParts") (at worst, out by a small factor (2-5)). The problem lies in the production of those parts (the Metal to RocketParts conversion), and the smelting of the Metal (MetalOre to Metal conversion). I'm pretty sure the MetalOre extraction is ok (at least in the right ballpark).

It seems to me that KCT abstracts all of the above into "build rocket": I'm sure it does take months to go from dirt to rocket.

My suggestion is to fix EL's smelting and machining processes (both rate and resource consumption (EC etc), and maybe trim down the productivity factors a little bit (using FullyEquipped where necessary), but don't focus on only the build times, as that's not where the problem really lies.

Five hours for one person to assemble one ton of parts into something usable is not overly wrong (unless dealing with electronics :P), especially in a good workshop.

Edited November 2, 2016 by taniwha

[aluc24]

3 minutes ago, taniwha said:

I believe EL's build times are fairly realistic, at least for structural stuff, as they the represent assembly of pre-made parts (hence "RocketParts") (at worst, out by a small factor (2-5)). The problem lies in the production of those parts (the Metal to RocketParts conversion), and the smelting of the Metal (MetalOre to Metal conversion). I'm pretty sure the MetalOre extraction is ok (at least in the right ballpark).

It seems to me that KCT abstracts all of the above into "build rocket": I'm sure it does take months to go from dirt to rocket.

My suggestion is to fix EL's smelting and machining processes (both rate and resource consumption (EC etc), and maybe trim down the productivity factors a little bit (using FullyEquipped where necessary), but don't focus on only the build times, as that's not where the problem really lies.

Five hours for one person to assemble one ton of parts into something usable is not overly wrong (unless dealing with electronics :P), especially in a good workshop.

Well, when you put it that way, I agree. Still, maybe you could put a general build time multiplier in the configuration? Or maybe multipliers for each operation (smelting, building)?

[taniwha]

Actually, one of my plans is to put KerbalHour requirements into part(module) recipes (to better cope with the difference between assembling a tank and its plumbing, and putting together a computer from components (ie resistors, capacitors, chips, etc)).

[aluc24]

1 minute ago, taniwha said:

Actually, one of my plans is to put KerbalHour requirements into part(module) recipes (to better cope with the difference between assembling a tank and its plumbing, and putting together a computer from components (ie resistors, capacitors, chips, etc)).

Okay, I see! Thanks!

[TomTheTragedy]

Not at all sure if you know this already or not but on the new 1.2.1 version of KSP the extraplanetary launchpads mod doesnt quite work as it should.

 instead of there being rocket parts to construct the rockets on the launchpads it is asking for materialkits and specialised materialkits, and i am not quite sure why this is but if you want i can give screenshots, i have a lot of other mods installed on the game save in question however it shows as incompatable from the launch menu. Again not sure if you know but just trying to help. Thanks for all the good work