Modmania

[henryrasia]

Hello, fellow KSPers! Today I'd like to show you a list of mods I'm planning to play with as well as opinions about them:

Module Manager // As I understand it allows mods to be uninstalled leaving part configs intact.

Toolbar // Must-have when using a lot of mods, like me.

Hyper Edit // I am NOT trimming orbits manually (especially with KSP's constant floating point errors)

Enhanced Navball // Good to know where normal/antinormal radial/antiradial are

Docking Alignment Indicator // Tool that should be in stock anyways

Welding Tool // Reducing part count is always good.

Engineer Redux // Give me my info!!!

Kerbal Joint Reinforcement // Wobble is NOT realistic!

Alternate Resource Panel // Good to know what each resource is at a glance

Kerbal Alarm Clock // Useful for keeping track of multiple missions.

Editor Extensions // always useful to have

Mechjeb 2 // Some tools are irrepleacable like orbit post aerobraking prediction

Deadly Reentry // Makes for cool challenges

FAR // KSP's aerodynamics model is a joke

RemoteTech 2 // Comms relays and delays are good challenges

Figaro GPS // Mapping with sense!

TAC Life Support // Makes probes useful

Infernal Robotics // CANADARMs and other hinges

KAS // attachment and containers are a must

KSP Interstellar // MOAR tech!

B9 Aerospace // Airplane parts!

Kw Rocketry // Big rockets (less parts)

Clouds and City Lights // pretty planets

I am afraid this will explode my computer, so I'm willing to add any light texture packs, texture managers and compressors that I might need. I'd like to know if any mods are incompatible among themselves, or with KSP 0.23 itself. Also, is there any good, reliable mod manager?

Thanks in advance, and I hope this list was useful to anyone wanting good mods!

[merendel]

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/59005

That link should take you to the plugin that will make all those mods not overload your memory. I run nearly the same pack of mods myself, just minus hyper, RT and IR prety much and it works fine. The only one I see in there that might have a conflict is remote tech and I say that only because scott manly was talking about it giveing him fits in his videos but that issue may be fixed in newer versions. I dont run RT myself so cant say for sure.

Edit, you might also consider precise node. I like it slightly better than mech jebs manuver node editor and it works even on ships I dont put a MJ on.

Edited March 7, 2014 by merendel

[CaptainKipard]

Hyperedit and FAR seem not to be entirely compatible. Ever since I got FAR I can't use Hyperedit's ship lander function. Kerbals suffer extreme g deaths, and ships explode in mid air.

[Geschosskopf]

Ah mods.... I, too, used to be a major mod fetisher. However, until the core game stabilizes somewhat, I've cut way back on mod usage because they have a very strong tendency to be save-killers when the game updates. At least for mods that add parts. Those that are just instrumentation usually aren't a problem.

First off, a game update often requires some sort of compatibility update to the mods. Sometimes this is more of a big deal than others but that's a crapshoot. It often happens that 1 or 2 mods you've built many ships around never gets updated at all and so kills your save, or gets updated long afterwards, and meanwhile you can't play that save. Sometimes, even if older versions of the mod still work by themselves, they will cause problems with other mods that were updated, so you can no longer use both at once. The longer a mod has been around, the more likely it is that its creator has become bored with KSP or had some real-life issue come up, so the greater chance of no or a delayed updated.

Second, sometimes modders, while their doing the compatibility update anyway, introduce save-breaking changes to their mods, deleting parts you've build your empire around. Or they might do a major "rebalancing" of stats, so now you've got ships in space that can no longer function as designed. This is more likely to happen with relatively new mods that haven't settled down yet.

Thus, at the bottom line, you can't really trust any mod to survive a game update intact. The more mods you use, especially part mods, the more likely it is your save will get broken. This is a real bummer if you had big, long-term plans and put a lot of work into them, relying heavily on mods, and then it's all gone. Of course, if you know this is possible and accept that risk, easy come, easy go. But it's a real nasty surprise if you're not expecting it.

So that's my caveat. I love mods and wish many of them were stock. But these days I mostly do stock-only with just a few part mods that I think are necessary to keep the game interesting for me. But I pick these carefully based on what I've seen of the authors. I want folks I think will stay the course for at least the foreseeable future, and who have a proven record of rapid update turnarounds without introducing game-breakers.

[RSF77]

I managed to have these and still keep KSP relatively stable (maybe one crash in 4-5 hours of play, provided I don't have any other programs open like firefox etc) with only 2GB of RAM and texture reduction on everything possible:

Toolbar

Action Group Manager

AKSTechnologies (some guns)

B9 Aerospace

Boulder Co active texture compression

DMTanks

GenesisRage minimum ambience plugin

HGR homegrown rocket parts

KAS

Kerbal Joint Reinforcement

Kethane

Klockeed Martin smart parts

Kommit Nucleonics atomic engines

KSPX

KW Rocketry

Magic Smoke Industries robotic parts

Mechjeb

Modular Fuel Tanks

NothkeSerCom "equipment" bays

Novapunch

Procedural Wings

SHMods (A few extra parts I liked and an interior space for the mk2 cockpit that doesn't have one)

And about 20-25 custom parts I've made.

Various plugins and requirements.

All on 2GB of RAM... total system RAM not just for KSP. This appears to be the limit though, if I install another "big" mod such as KW or B9 with no texture reduction it starts crashing a lot. Acutally, B9 itself is such a huge mod that it alone starts crashing if I don't use texture reduction, but with it I can install all these extra mods.

Edited March 7, 2014 by RSF77