[1.12] Extraplanetary Launchpads v6.99.3

[DarknessHasLost]

On 11/12/2016 at 10:59 AM, beta546 said:

Hey does anyone know how to make this work with stock `ore` rather than the `metal ore` this mod adds? I tried messing around with the .cfgs, changed all references of metalore to ore, but it does nothing but stop it working with either of them. guess the actual plugin plays a part in it..

 

Edit. Looks like it is possible to change the stock drills and converters to use metal ore, instead of the stock ore lol....I just think it is much easier to only have one resource to deal with to make rocket parts and also fuel, and the stock drills are much nicer...

you'd have to edit the Smelter, thats the part that handles the Ore to metal conversion.

[DarknessHasLost]

On 11/16/2016 at 7:10 AM, schlosrat said:

Is there a way to have the recycle bins produce rocket parts instead of metal? Could this be done with a CFG edit / MM patch?

It drops metal as kind of a logic thing, You ever seen the Shreading machines on youtube that can turn a car into dust. that is what the recycler does. then it gets changed back into rocket parts. its supposed to add a level of difficulty. its not too hard of a fix though. change the Recyclers CFG, under that material, change Metal to rocket parts

[cgwhite4]

Extraplanetary Launchpads has gone a long way toward my current KSP campaign (which is in Sandbox mode).  I now have EL-capable bases on Mun, Minmus, Gilly, Eve, Duna, Ike, and Moho, with Dres one module (the launchpad itself) away from being fully online.  I just established a colony on Pol, and should soon begin sending the necessary infrastructure there to support missions to the other moons of Jool, enabling me to avoid having to worry about outbound interplanetary transfer windows for these missions, as well as significantly reduce my delta V requirements.  The view from my Pol colony is quite interesting.  While I must take resource availability and terrain into account, I prefer to set up bases that are on tidelocked moons on the near side of said moons, resulting in constant views of the planet (the same principle applies to my base on Duna, which is mutually-tidelocked to Ike).  With Pol being the outermost moon of Jool, this results in a view from my base where I can not only see Jool itself, but also Tylo, Vall, and Laythe (Bop is too small to be visible from Pol).  I am still waiting for the scrap metal storage issue to be resolved, but am currently working around it by moving my spent workshop modules (which double as a means of re-crewing) out of the way.  Junk is starting to accrue at my base on Gilly, from which I have launched most of my recent missions, and thus it tends to require re-crewing most often.

Without this mod, it would not have been possible to perform my original Eve landing the way I did, due to aerodynamic constraints imposed by Kerbin's atmosphere.  I have not had nearly as much trouble with any mission since.  It was because of the Eve mission that I went looking for a mod with this functionality, which is certainly among the biggest things missing from the base game (if not THE biggest).  Bases with refueling systems are good, but bases with launch sites are better.  The only mods I have right now are EL and its prerequisites (MM and KAS (current and beta of upcoming new version)).  I am looking forward to the missions I have planned for the remaining moons of Jool, as well as Eeloo.  Great work, taniwha.

[rasta013]

21 hours ago, dunebugmi said:

but using ore worked ok for me last night

It never had to do with ore working or not.  Ore is way too light.  It's density in stock in ridiculously low.  So, to simulate the difficulty of ACTUALLY extracting real metal of some sort the choice was made to use MetalOre instead and Taniwha controls the density of that material in the CRP.  This allows him to control for the unrealistically light Ore.

[theJesuit]

8 hours ago, rasta013 said:

It never had to do with ore working or not.  Ore is way too light.  It's density in stock in ridiculously low.  So, to simulate the difficulty of ACTUALLY extracting real metal of some sort the choice was made to use MetalOre instead and Taniwha controls the density of that material in the CRP.  This allows him to control for the unrealistically light Ore.

Just wondering... what would it take to change the density of stock ore? Could that be achieved through an MM .cfg patch?  In which case I could write up a download patch for it that would also adjust the parts from EL.  I had been thinking of doing something like this anyway.

However now that I know the reasoning do like that stock ore is something spongy and light to make rocket feul and life support stuff from.  Metals are then a different kettle of fish.

Peace.

[rasta013]

1 hour ago, theJesuit said:

Just wondering... what would it take to change the density of stock ore? Could that be achieved through an MM .cfg patch?

Yup exactly.  You could MM patch the Ore definition in Resources.cfg to change it's density.

[horace]

i watced youtube about this mod but i still dont know what this mod does

launchpads

but no launch pads in the vid

[goldenpsp]

1 hour ago, horace said:

i watced youtube about this mod but i still dont know what this mod does

launchpads

but no launch pads in the vid

You watched a video presumably about a rocket/craft being built off kerbin and still don't get it?  That's what this does. lets you build rockets off world (in orbit or on other bodies).

[horace]

it talk about this mod

[horace]

2 hours ago, horace said:

it talk about this mod

 

2 hours ago, goldenpsp said:

You watched a video presumably about a rocket/craft being built off kerbin and still don't get it?  That's what this does. lets you build rockets off world (in orbit or on other bodies).

 

i forgot to quote

[goldenpsp]

1 minute ago, horace said:

 

i forgot to quote

Either way, I just told you what this mod does.

[horace]

oh really ?? sorry

17 minutes ago, goldenpsp said:

Either way, I just told you what this mod does.

 

[Jagzeplin]

not certain which forum to ask this in since it could be a MKS thing but im currently having an issue getting contracts to see new vessels i build in orbit as "new." i used the mks launchpad with the robot arms if that matters

[TheRagingIrishman]

@Jagzeplin if I remember correctly that's a long-standing EL bug

[Jagzeplin]

so contract completion can only come from stuff launched out of KSC? damn that sucks

Edited April 3, 2017 by Jagzeplin

[Brigadier]

18 minutes ago, Jagzeplin said:

so contract completion can only come from stuff launched out of KSC? damn that sucks

That said, if you've really finished the contract and it's a known EL bug, simply complete the contract in the Alt-F12 window.

[Jagzeplin]

i didnt have to. for some reason it fixed itself when i quit and played again. thanks for tip about alt F12 thing tho. i didnt know about that at all

Edited April 4, 2017 by Jagzeplin

[dunebugmi]

On 4/1/2017 at 2:13 PM, rasta013 said:

It never had to do with ore working or not.  Ore is way too light.  It's density in stock in ridiculously low.  So, to simulate the difficulty of ACTUALLY extracting real metal of some sort the choice was made to use MetalOre instead and Taniwha controls the density of that material in the CRP.  This allows him to control for the unrealistically light Ore.

I'm confused about the relationship between density and difficulty of extracting metal.  Are you saying that KSP ore is so light that impossibly large containers would be needed to store a sufficient amount to make a ton of metal ore?

[rasta013]

17 minutes ago, dunebugmi said:

I'm confused about the relationship between density and difficulty of extracting metal.  Are you saying that KSP ore is so light that impossibly large containers would be needed to store a sufficient amount to make a ton of metal ore?

Basically yeah. 

Density of stock ore = 0.010 and Density of MetalOre = 0.0275 making it 175% denser.  So not exactly impossibly large but definitely dealing with considerably higher quantities if you want to keep the same conversion rates of ore->RocketParts instead of MetalOre->RocketParts.

[theJesuit]

1 hour ago, rasta013 said:

Basically yeah. 

Density of stock ore = 0.010 and Density of MetalOre = 0.0275 making it 175% denser.  So not exactly impossibly large but definitely dealing with considerably higher quantities if you want to keep the same conversion rates of ore->RocketParts instead of MetalOre->RocketParts.

I myself am in two minds.  I like the idea of KISS [Keep it Simple, Stupid] that Squad went for in stock.  Ore as the magical substance within the crust in some areas that can be utilized for fueling rockets.  I've carried that idea across to my Kerbalism profile (shameless plug for my sig) as Ore being the source for generating Air and food/water as Ore isn't just rocks per say, but elements that are able to make fuel and oxidiser and monopropellant, so why not the base elements for food/water air as well?

What is the question in my mind is that if Ore is actually elements/ organic chemistry chemicals (fuel etc), and only makes up 5-10% of the rock in a reasonable location, then what is the other 90%?  Surely that is the stuff we want  to build solid rockets from?

So MetalOre then makes a bit more sense, in density and use.  But it lessens the KISS principle.

Having only Ore, and not worrying about what I said above however, if you are on a planetary body then Ore is basically free you just need to extract more (more time) to be able to make your rockets.  Asteroids won't give you a much bang for your buck.

Peace.

[rasta013]

24 minutes ago, theJesuit said:

I myself am in two minds.

I fully understand the mindset of not wanting to mess with long process chains or simply the lightweight approach to accomplishing many of the fun things in the game like life support or off-planet construction.  Myself, I go the other way.  I've been heading more and more towards realism in many ways and the longer, more complicated resource chains for me are part of the fun.  Having to both find a different resource and arrange for said resource to be chained together properly is all part of the fun for me.  

That's the beauty of KSP - we can all get what we want in many ways.

[DStaal]

4 hours ago, theJesuit said:

I myself am in two minds.  I like the idea of KISS [Keep it Simple, Stupid] that Squad went for in stock.  Ore as the magical substance within the crust in some areas that can be utilized for fueling rockets.  I've carried that idea across to my Kerbalism profile (shameless plug for my sig) as Ore being the source for generating Air and food/water as Ore isn't just rocks per say, but elements that are able to make fuel and oxidiser and monopropellant, so why not the base elements for food/water air as well?

What is the question in my mind is that if Ore is actually elements/ organic chemistry chemicals (fuel etc), and only makes up 5-10% of the rock in a reasonable location, then what is the other 90%?  Surely that is the stuff we want  to build solid rockets from?

So MetalOre then makes a bit more sense, in density and use.  But it lessens the KISS principle.

Having only Ore, and not worrying about what I said above however, if you are on a planetary body then Ore is basically free you just need to extract more (more time) to be able to make your rockets.  Asteroids won't give you a much bang for your buck.

Peace.

I'd actually disagree with this characterization of stock.

Squad did go for KISS - the only purpose for an ISRU in stock is to create fuel, so you have one resource that can create any fuel.

However...  They were more subtle than that.  Note that adding MetalOre doesn't mean you need to have a plugin: Squad put in a resource *system*, not just a resource.  If you want a new resource to support your mod, all it takes is a config file describing the resource.  So they kept the base game simple by limiting the scope, but allowed you to build arbitrary complexity on top of it.

(Now, I will note one thing in relation to your Kerbalism profile: One of the most in-demand ores for fuel is *water*.  You can split it into hydrogen and oxygen, which is about the ideal chemical fuel mixture, or you can use that hydrogen in atomic rockets as it's about the ideal propellant there.  Or, remix it into H2O2 or something and make it a monopropellant.  And of course you can drink it, or split it and use the oxygen for air, etc.  So if 'Ore' is some hydrate of some sort, or at least something that can be broken down into such, it could well be used for fuel, water, air, and even as a large part of the food production chain.)

[theJesuit]

1 hour ago, DStaal said:

I'd actually disagree with this characterization of stock.

Squad did go for KISS - the only purpose for an ISRU in stock is to create fuel, so you have one resource that can create any fuel.

However...  They were more subtle than that.  Note that adding MetalOre doesn't mean you need to have a plugin: Squad put in a resource *system*, not just a resource.  If you want a new resource to support your mod, all it takes is a config file describing the resource.  So they kept the base game simple by limiting the scope, but allowed you to build arbitrary complexity on top of it.

(Now, I will note one thing in relation to your Kerbalism profile: One of the most in-demand ores for fuel is *water*.  You can split it into hydrogen and oxygen, which is about the ideal chemical fuel mixture, or you can use that hydrogen in atomic rockets as it's about the ideal propellant there.  Or, remix it into H2O2 or something and make it a monopropellant.  And of course you can drink it, or split it and use the oxygen for air, etc.  So if 'Ore' is some hydrate of some sort, or at least something that can be broken down into such, it could well be used for fuel, water, air, and even as a large part of the food production chain.)

Totally agree with the resource system comment/ clarification.  

I know the reason for Squad calling the standardised resource Ore but Hydrate seems to be a better fit for what you can use it for in stock (couldn't think of that term for my above post).  

This conversation has been quite useful for me and I think if I ever did a Simplified pack across GC EL Kerbalism et al. Then I'd probably redo the resources for it to make it quite clear.  Thanks!

Peace.

 

[taniwha]

The density issue of MetalOre vs Ore is not about difficulty, but rather about believability. Ore works out to 4t/m³ while MetalOre is 5.5t/m³. Hematite (the basis for MetalOre) is 5.3t/m³, so MetalOre is slightly over-dense, but I based it on Earth's average density to account for various metal ores (despite Metal being based on iron).

Anyway, because EL works with resource mass rather than resource volume (KSP works using volume, but EL computes the volume using the resource density), any non-zero density would work, until you start thinking about things.

Also, really, EL's densities for Metal and MetalOre are a bit high: they assume solid lumps of the material, not broken up lumps. For equal spheres, the density should be about 0.74x what is is, but it's probably better to keep the density as a solid lump and design storage containers around it (ie, a container with a capacity of 1m³ would hold only 0.75m³ worth of solid material (150u instead of 200u)). Not something I did for EL's containers, though. Also the density of RocketParts does already take packing into account (thus RP being only 0.5t/m³). Similarly for ScrapMetal.

[taniwha]

As an addition to the above regarding packing density: it turns out that rod-stock is very efficient because it is circle packing a 2d plane: you get about 90% efficiency when the container area is much bigger than your rod area (an inscribed circle has 0.9069 of the area of the enclosing hexagon). Any additional "losses" would arise at the edges of the container.

Just food for thought.