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How much do YOU rely on MechJeb?


The Flitter

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I wouldn't say I'm dependent on it, though I do use it a lot. Just about everything MJ does for me, whether maneuvers or calculations, I could do manually if I were so inclined and had time to spare.

I am dependent on it for reducing tedium and repetitiveness, so I would definitely enjoy the game less without it.

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I mostly use it for orbital transfers, inclination changes, and landing, stuff where precision is a real necessity. I particularly suck at landing, it's a very nerve-wracking experience for me and enough on the "not fun" side that I have no qualms letting MechJeb handle it pretty much all the time.

I also use it for executing maneuver nodes on my interplanetary missions, but that's more out of necessity than laziness. I mainly use ion engines for those kinds of ships, and I am NOT staying up 9 hours to babysit a braking burn.

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I dont use it anymore, when i started i used MJ alot, then there was a while (think around 0.21) that NJ didnt work and had to play a while without MJ till it was updated..

In that time i noticed i've gotten to a point that i really didnt need it anymore, and all MJ could do, i was able to do more efficient, and faster as with MJ.

Resently i gave Mj2 a shot, but was annoyed by it, that it still needed alot more fuel/monopropellant that i need by manual control, so removed it again.

I rely more on the flightcomputer of RT2 nowerdays, allthough that has some weird quirks as well..

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I would not say I'm a "Mechjeb addict" (is there a meeting today ? :blush:), I use it for orbital physics things, only RDV for now, and docking.

And your post is ambiguous The Flitter: are we rely on it or are we depend on it... not the same thing. I don't always trust it as it can be easily fooled (put an engine on top of your ship and it doesn't figured out prograde is retrograde), and it used too much monop on docking IMHO, like we are on a rush of docking (kerbals have some internal tank(s) emergency maybe :D), and tried once landing guidance, I'm already good at crashing so I doesn't need any its help.

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I am dependent on it for reducing tedium and repetitiveness, so I would definitely enjoy the game less without it.

Yep. I treat it like a flight computer. Especially the instrumentation. Mechjeb calculates what I tell it to, I fly. I find no fun in pushing-pulling maneuver nodes. Yes I do some of it manually when it makes sense. But those routine things that I know how to do but it's faster, easier, and more precise to have mechjeb do it. Some of that mostly because of limitations with the gui. Like I generally figure out my interplanetary transfers using the node editor and do it manually, but being able to make .1 m/s adjustments is nice.

Though I do like using Smart A.S.S. for docking. Setting it to "Part -" is pretty awesome. I don't use the auto-dock, auto-ascent, or auto-land. The autopilot functions work but a human can do most of it far better. MJ does usually execute nodes really well though if your tolerances are set well, but I find I can do them better if I have a read-out that shows me real-time the parameter I'm trying to change. I love the landing prediction (again flight computer use), and I've been using it on ascent to figure out my final apoapsis on worlds with atmospheres.

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i use it so i can yell at it for not working. most of the time i just use it to point my ship in the direction i want it to point, and it even gets that wrong. i also use it for launch, especially when the launcher is one of my usual payload pushers that i use for putting hardware into space. it ruins my less conventional launchers. the only other thing i use is translatron, to assist in flying vtols.

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I've made it a point to do all of the things manually a few times before I switch to using MJ to automate them, it seems a reasonable progression for career mode. People figure it out, teach the computers to do it with less hassle. Sometimes I manually set up burns and then just leave it to MJ to run them because it'll always be more precise on that part than I or because I have to walk away or it's after a long time warp (or often times all 3).

I'm often playing these days with a 7 month little girl sitting on my lap who *loves* to type on the keyboard like daddy. That makes manually flying darn tricky (especially ascent's) because her favorite key to hit is the spacebar. And yes, it's lead to some epic yet frustrating reloads (I actually set up a sandbox for her with a couple ships that do nothing bit spin and/or explode enthusiastically when staged, she loves it lol).

In the end if you view it as a mission planner/controller simulator instead of a flight simulator I hardly see that it'd matter if you actually manned the keyboard for every m/s, even without signal delay NASA probably wouldn't have someone sitting at a keyboard manually typing commands for every maneuver :)

Edited by docfish
wow those were some long sentences, cleaned up for legibility
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I'm often playing these days with a 7 month little girl sitting on my lap who *loves* to type on the keyboard like daddy. That makes manually flying darn tricky (especially ascent's) because her favorite key to hit is the spacebar.

Hah. 8 month old boy in my case. MJ + autostage + move the keyboard is key for me.

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I rely on it as much as I want to :)

To me I love the designing ships, I love the logistics of did I bring enough fuel, did I bring enough life support, what do I need to pack to set up a duna base.

The actual piloting skills? that part of the game does not interest me at all. Let mechJeb handle that part of the game and I'll have fun. So most of the time I have it launch, rendevouz, docking, land, transfer, etc. I just don't want to do them, they aren't fun for me.

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My main uses for it are the orbit info. I put mechjeb on just about every craft just so I have the orbit info available. I hate having to rely on the map to see the info. I also love the SmartA.S.S. I mean I could do all these corrections. But I'd rather just punch keys on the flight computer. I haven't used Auto Ascent for a long time now... Probably since .21 or whenever they fixed the crazy SAS wobble. Even though I've done launches a bajillion times now, I still like to control my liftoff. And for course plotting. Again I could drag manuever nodes all over the place, but It's easier to punch them into a flight computer. Knowing what you have to do is the interesting part for me. Actually plotting it exactly is a chore sometimes. But sometimes, like when I'm doing transfers around Jool I find it fun to plot them out. Then again sometimes Mechjeb comes up with it's own ideas altogether

Hey Dave, lets go to Duna 245 Days from now!"

No thank you Hal, I think I'll just go now.

Course Plotted Dave.

The course you plotted plows us straight through the middle of the planet,Hal!

I Don't see the problem, Dave.

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I use it just for the information it displays, and for some automatic launches, as it gets tedious for me to manually take care of every single rocket I make, and since I use Remote Tech I have the habit to use it for putting Communications probes in orbit while I just do anything else.

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I only got it in the first place so I could use D***ed robotics, only to find out that it (robotics) was outdated and no longer worked, instead I found out about infernal robotics.... But, I get mechjeb a couple of tries anyways..

my verdict on it was : you might as well watch an uncut scott manley video, you just end up doing, launch assist, rendezvous assist, docking assist in that order and then there's no real accomplishment...

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I have only recently started using it, and it is useless for most of what I do other than the information readouts. But I can use KER for that and KER has a much smaller footprint. But I do like using MJ for my rockets that I have to launch repeatedly for communications satellite placement in orbit. With the RSS mod it is kind of tiresome launching one massive rocket after another to put it several hundred thousand meters above the surface in a set place and orbital altitude.

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i learned a lot with mechjeb in the old days.

today i use MJ either as precision instrument or as automation of stupid stuff:

calculator in VAB, target data, exact orbit data (are 100% circular in KSO?), smart ass for ascent and docking, and maneuver autopilot for long burns or if i want to make myself a coffee.

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I wouldn't say I'm dependent on it, though I do use it a lot. Just about everything MJ does for me, whether maneuvers or calculations, I could do manually if I were so inclined and had time to spare.

I am dependent on it for reducing tedium and repetitiveness, so I would definitely enjoy the game less without it.

THIS! My opinion is if you can't do it manually you shouldn't get a computer to automate it. I'm in the same boat, I ust it for just about everything (except docking, I have yet to use it for docking) but if the need arose I could do it all on my own (And have, Just check out my Mission Logs where I didn't have autopilot for a while) If you don't know how to do something MechJeb isn't going to teach you, it's going to do it for you. I feel that you need to understand what's going on and be able to perform the action yourself before relying on a computer to do it for you.

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I need repeatable ascents so I often use ascent guidance. I also really can't live without the info displays. I'll also use it as "my plot team at mission control," i.e. to rough out maneuver nodes that I then tweak, and for precision burns.

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