.24 reusing ships?

[SkyRender]

What I mean is that if you launch on a rocket, and reuse the payload, it'll be useless without the rocket for the initial stage.

Sure, then you'd be forced to recover for value and re-launch it from blueprint. I see where you're coming from there, and had in fact thought of that. There's not really an easy solution either, other than to just make it so that you have to recover ALL vessels for a percentage of their base value and re-launch a fresh-from-blueprint model instead of directly reusing them.

[blubbermonkeys]

Kind of like a repair system right?

As in you ONLY have to buy back the parts you have previously destroyed or lost?

[Sigma117]

Kind of like a repair system right?

As in you ONLY have to buy back the parts you have previously destroyed or lost?

That and/or try flying with a broken ship if you lost something unessential like a landing light.

[michaelphoenix22]

Presumably there would be the option to recover landed "debris"-flagged items from Kerbin as well. That would help with some of that.

if there isnt because of how debris despawns... im adding probe cores to all my boosters

[astropapi1]

if there isnt because of how debris despawns... im adding probe cores to all my boosters

In case you haven't noticed, probes have nothing to do with it.

As soon as a moving object gets farther than 2.5 km, it gets deleted doesn't matter if it's controllable or not. A workaround for this would be to use the Lazor system. It can extend the loading distance enough for your boosters to land safely.

[G'th]

I would actually imagine they would do it so that when you recover a vessel, you get a "freebie" part for every part on that vessel.

IE, if you have a command pod, a decoupler, and a fuel tank and engine and recover it all, then you'll be able to place one copy of those parts for free or minimal cost in your next craft. Also a possibility is that launching an already built craft that uses the same parts will also provide a refund for the recovered parts.

[Sandworm]

I am sure that Squad will do something. They abandoned any thought of realism or simulation long ago.

Spacecraft are not recycled. There has been ONE and only ONE craft that has been to orbit more than once and that was shuttle. But if you look carefully at the shuttle program it was extremely expensive, far more expensive than if they had stuck with use-once capsules, and never really met its design goals (ie fly every two weeks). There is a reason that the only things flying today don't go twice.

[vexx32]

Discussion on development of KSP and/or features and so forth goes in the Suggestions and Development Discussion section, fellas. I've moved the thread for y'all.

[Pockrtplanesairways]

I like this idea but i dont think it should be implemented until parts cost money and are in limited stock.

[SkyHook]

I think this will be an amazing feature once it is implemented. It will make me think about the craft that I design and not be so wasteful! A spacecraft earned is a spacecraft valued.

[Commissar]

I totally agree with the idea of having somewhere to store craft that have landed, SSTO's, planes and also ground support crew. I really like the idea of being able to service an SSTO on the tarmac and send it off again, without completely reloading the craft. But having support vehicles and other parked craft round KSC gets so laggy. It would be nice to be able to park them in hanger and have them unloaded from the scene but preserving their state (fuel levels, missing/broken parts, etc).

better idea: FIX THE LAG!

[KvickFlygarn87]

Hmm, what would be really neat would be using a grab-able hose from the fuel tank at SPH (or maybe that big ball at RnD building - it could be a fuel tank) and stick it to a plane. After that, you get refueled at some cost.

[rkman]

how will income work? Will successful missions grant additional funding?

I'm pretty sure Squad has said you will get some funding anyway to avoid "game over" due to failing a few times.

Makes sense, assuming Kerbals are really eager to get to space. So they just keep funding their space program no matter how long it takes to get there.

[coolitic]

Repair costs should depend on damage levels and damage types.

[tuckjohn]

I have an idea on how to earn money.... when you get science points you also get money. When you recover a ship, you can either sell the parts of the ship for (75%?) Of their original cost, or you can recover the parts for feuture missions

[EatVacuum]

Whoa... Being able to exchange science for money is a great idea! It would make progression slower in career mode it seems like, but would allow you to keep making progress after all the research nodes are unlocked. Neat.

There has been an addon that does just this since just after science came out. It's called Kerbal Economy.

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/52915-0-22-Kerbal-Economy-1-1-1

It adds a bit of challenge to do more with less but that adds to the fun. A failed mission becomes a significan failure, you think about designing ships economically. No more building rockets with 7000 m/s delta ve to go to the Mun. You recover the value of returned ship parts so it rewards reuse. You can also adjust the difficulty by changing the exchange rate of science for $$$.

I've enjoyed this mod, so I'm really looking forward to seeing how the economy will work in .24. In the meantime, give this a try until .24 comes out.

Edited February 14, 2014 by EatVacuum

[likke_A_boss]

IIRC, there was a part inventory number in 0.22, and it disappeared in 0.23. I wonder if that will be back and you can recover a ships parts, add them to your inventory, and either sell those used or keep for later. I no that idea is already motioned, but I thought I'd throw in my 2 cents, too:sticktongue:

[Ghost13]

I gues there only two ways to do it right in the matter of gameplay.

1. Any suviving parts are converted into money with some recovery cap. (That is what proably Sqad will do)

2. Any parts survived the flight are re-stock and you can use it in further designes as free spare parts. (Somewhat unrealistic but acceptable for the gameplay mechanic)

Any other implication proably won't fit nicely into current spacship design system. And if Sqad will seriously go for spaceflight economy they need to do something about distance cap where ship gets erased by the game while in the atmosphere. I can still manage fully reusable SSTO or use Two stage booster that goes out from the atmoshere release payload that circulise it orbit and then return to the atmoshere. But I would really like to have the way to preserve my stages in a usual launch.

[NoMrBond]

Some stuff would be 'more' re-usable than others (essentially just different %'s), or recovered items, instead of coming back and automagically turning into money, would have some kind of 'ticker' in the VAB, like a little side number, which says how many of those parts you have in your recovered stockpile and could be included in a ship for less money (than a 'new' part)

SRB's would need to be refilled so $% recovery would be different than, say, an engine which might be reconditioned after recovery, while parts you shed during ascent would need something on the 2.4km-from-active deletion logic which basically checks for parachutes and probable landing etc and if whatever conditions are met it would be counted as 'recovered' when it gets atmosphere removed

Maybe parts could only be recovered/reconditioned a certain number of times before being scrapped (returning a small amount of research instead of money) at EoL.

[P.Funk]

Rather than starting a new thread I figured I'd throw my thought in here.

Basically it would be nice to have a Hanger of sorts near the runway at the KSC that you could place recovered vessels into, mostly I'm thinking things like SSTOs and regular aircraft, that are despawned form active memory so that you can store perfectly functional ships within easy taxi range of the runway without having to deal with the massive lag of loading all of them up when you come in to land or take off from the KSC.

Basically it'd be like the garage in a GTA game. You just have a few big hangers and you can taxi your aircraft in there, or drag them in there or whatever and when you close the door it isn't in memory anymore but all the flaws in the ship are still there. If you had a hard landing and lost a bit then its gone, or loose or whatever. Ultimately this could allow another menu where you'd be able to do things like refuel it or perhaps open it into the VAB/SPH where you could make more limited alternations like adding struts or removing little things like lights or ladders or whatever. If you had a design that was iterated further you could bring it in to the VAB this way to basically upgrade it to the new "block" as they do with real aircraft. With an SSTO you could use this as the way that you reassemble it with a new payload for launch.

My thought is I really want to avoid the gamey thing of removing a recovered vehicle from existence and having some abstract way of justifying how its recovery benefited you. I don't want to get a free part that was in the old vessel, I want the same part attached to the same fuselage with all the same aerodynamic properties or torque issues or fuel line problems and you get tweak not just a design but the same literal assembly of parts and see how long you can use it.

Imagine being able to literally use the same SSTO for years in KSP. Every reentry would have serious meaning because you're really trying not to lose that ship that has served you so well for so many missions. Not only that but as you refine your designs every iteration that you field will be unique. The Mk1 will have a tendency to do THIS while the Mk2 specifically avoided this. The Mk1 you recovered last mission you brought up in the VAB and tried to add some of the changes made to the Mk2 so that it handles a bit better, but because you can't fully revamp these ships in the VAB/SPH you make compromises and it will always handle just differently and so it has character.

To me this would make a properly re-usable fleet possible without needing to be too involved in balancing some arbitrary recovery system. Land your spaceplane and taxi it to the hanger and reload it for another mission and fly her again and again, warts and all.