"Unfashionable" KSP Install

[Pecan]

We've had a few threads on "what mod(s) should I use?" recently - this is the opposite. I have been adding more and more mods and even though I avoid part packs my poor old, weak, PC is suffering so I'm seeing which I would prefer to remove.

Amusingly enough the only roughly appropriate antonym (opposite) of 'mod' I could find was "unfashionable" so - "fine, I'm going to make an unfashionable KSP install".

Before any of this though please note:

a) This is ONLY because I have a weak PC; there's absolutely nothing wrong with KSP or these mods and I'm not complaining about anything.

Every one of these that fails to 'make the cut' is dropped with regret - I only installed them in the first place and kept them until now because I like them.

Dropped:

• FAR. To start with the most important - it's a recent install and I know I really must learn to use it sooner or later but just now I'd have to redesign and relearn too much. Gone, but definitely my fault. Equally definitely to return 'when I can give it some time'.
  
• KER. Sorry; now MJ gives reference-bodies for deltaV/TWR and offers so much more I'm just not using you like I did. Heartbreak.
  
• EVE. Lovely as you are I just don't spend enough time looking at the scenery to appreciate you.
  
• Alternate Resource Panel. Great, but just not quite useful enough to make it.
  
• Aviation Lights. Not top of most people's list anyway. I'm a real-life navigator and such things 'should' be there but adding them makes my ships 'non stock' for no really good reason. Sorry.
  

On Probation:

• KOS - don't actually like it much, but RT2 keeps it essential.
  
• DREC, RPM and MFD - like EVE I just don't spend enough time with them to appreciate them fully.
  
• KAS & IR - and again, underused. Just me this time though.
  

Secure:

• Active Texture Management - if you're nursing a sick computer you don't shoot the doctor!
  
• Chatterer & Kerbquake - "totally useless, totally fun". I won't say I couldn't live without them. Not sure I'd want to though.
  
• Kethane, TAC LS & CLS - reasons to do stuff.
  
• NRAP, Navball Docking Alignment, SM, Proc Fairings & AGX - tools to do it with.
  
• SH-Mk2 & TT-Mk3 cockpit internals - even if I don't spend a lot of time IVA there should at least be an internal view to look at!
  

Core:

• Toolbar & MM - almost everything else needs one or the other.
  
• MJ - primarily information but I do use its autopilot rendezvous quite a bit and others when I want a coffee :-)
  
• RT2 & SCANSat - the fact that I value these so highly probably means I have a 'thing' for computers. This one tells me it loves me too. [Help!]
  
• KAC - hey, I can't even wake myself up on the right day without an alarm clock.
  

So - your turn. Which mods have you, or would you, reluctantly give(n) up? No abuse please, especially not to the programmers/modellers who put all their hard work into making the mods in the first place.

[ETA: Oh man, I can't believe I made such a huge typo in the title :-( ]

Edited April 28, 2014 by Pecan

[cantab]

I haven't used many mods so far.

Briefly tried then dropped:

Editor Extensions. It didn't do what I wanted; discussion has lead me to conclude I'll need to find or make a ModuleManager config for it. I might bring it back just to be able to change vertical snapping though, restarting the game to turn that on and off is annoying.

TAC Fuel Balancer. Again it didn't quite do what I want, which is to type in the amount of fuel I want to have in a tank, but I got the job done anyway by using the minimum transfer speed. However I'm not using my space station enough to make it a permanent feature, I'll just add it when I need it.

Things I have but could drop, most droppable first:

Kerbal Alarm Clock. It helps, but I could manage my missions myself if need be.

VOID, just about. It's a huge help for Kerbin system science, but I can get by with the biome maps and a load of trial and error.

Engineer Redux, again just about. Manual number-crunching the delta-V is doable. I have had performance hits before though they seem fixed, nonetheless I'll often use just the build engineer and go without the flight engineer.

Precise Node. I would really hate not having this, I've come to far prefer it over the stock node editing handles. But I did play for a long time without it, making Mun and Minmus landings and a Duna flyby, so I guess I can manage.

Things I couldn't do without:

None! At least no mods.

Alexmoon's launch window planner, on the other hand, I don't know how to make an interplanetary transfer without.

[Skipants]

These are the mods that I'm currently using and plan to keep. I'm not to big on adding parts but I like adding features!

Part mods:

- KW Rocketry

Realism mod:

- TAC Life Support (I like the little bit of extra challenge)

Helpful things that I make the game more pleasant IMO:

- Enhanced NavBall

- Kerbal joint reinforcment (probably don't need this one with the 23.5 update)

- MechJeb (mostly for DeltaV, TWR, and flight data info)

- Docking Port Alignment Indicator

- RCS build aid

Makes it look pretty!

- Environmental and Visual Enhancements

[Pecan]

But what about the ones you haven't kept? Reasons for uninstalling is what I'm after here.

[CalculusWarrior]

You can always drop kOS and turn off the transmission delay feature in RemoteTech; that's what I did when I had it installed. I feel like I'm fairly happy with all my mods, at the moment I'm doing without KAS and Infernal Robotics, but I may reinstall them one day.

My mod list is going to be huge, as I have a lot installed:

• Toolbar, naturally
  
• Active Texture Management, which I only really keep around for keeping my Visual Enhancements working well.
  
• As mentioned above, Environmental Visual Enhancements, the new volumetric clouds are beautiful, and I have also installed the Better Atmospheres patch which enhances them even further.
  
• Distant Object Enhancement, as I do love watching the planets drift by while interplanetary, or just seeing my space station fly overhead.
  
• Editor Extensions, a tiny mod that is indispensable when building spacecraft.
  
• Enhanced Navball, again, indispensable.
  
• FASA Launch Towers, I didn't want to install all of the FASA parts, but the launch towers were so darn pretty I just had to put them in. They really spice up a launch.
  
• Floor It, a mod which pretty much maps the Z key to throttling up (pretty much the opposite of the X key). It comes in useful.
  
• Goodspeed Fuel Transfer, I love this mod as it does away with a lot of the finicky fuel transferring in the stock game.
  
• Raster Prop Manager, it is a super nice mod, it makes IVAs a lot nicer.
  
• Kerbal Engineer, of course. What self-respecting rocket scientist doesn't have a delta-v readout?
  
• HyperEdit, for nefarious reasons.
  
• KerbQuake, as you said, it adds so much atmosphere to the game, but is a very small mod.
  
• KW Rocketry Fairings, I had played around with Procedural Fairings, but considered them to be quite 'cheaty', as you can build a fairing that's larger than your rocket! I enjoy designing payloads so that they'll fit in the limited space it gives me (or if I can't, I'll just launch it without a fairing)
  
• Mechjeb, but curiously I only use it for predicting my landing site, a godsend when trying to land a spaceplane at the KSC.
  
• Module Manager, again this mod is indispensable.
  
• HotRockets, it makes rocket launches prettier.
  
• Navball Docking Alignment Indicator, I've switched back and forth between this mod and NavyFish's separate window, but I enjoy this more as it makes the indicator appear directly on the navball, leaving more room on the screen.
  
• Final Frontier, I love how this adds a lot more individuality to my kerbals.
  
• RCS Build Aid, super useful when trying to line up centres of mass with engines and reaction control systems.
  
• SCANSat, I was a fan of MapSat when it was still around, so when I saw that Raster Prop Manager integrated with SCANSat, I figured I'd install it. However, I have deleted the antennae which come with that mod and put the functionality within each cockpit and the stock antennae (different levels, mind you. Cockpits can only see the map, while the level of scanning capabilities goes up with antenna power)
  
• Select Root, single-handedly the most useful mod to have when building ships. This allows you to select another part as the root of your ship, which comes in incredibly handy when building subassemblies or landers.
  
• Kerbal Alarm Clock, indispensable.
  
• Texture Replacer, I use this to make my skybox more beautiful, as well as make my kerbals have different faces, further improving their individuality.
  
• Trim Indicators, I have to say I haven't really utilized this mod yet, but it is so small and has the potential to come in handy one day, so I'm keeping it.
  
• Tweakable Everything, a great mod which I love using to tweak the power of reaction wheels or let solar panels start deployed on the launch pad.
  
• VOID, I like to see the vessel's information on-screen (why I don't use Kerbal Engineer for this, I'll never know).
  
• Warp Unlocker, a relatively untested mod for me, it simply adds higher time warps, as well as removes the restriction about warping below a specific altitude.
  

Mods which I am currently on the fence about are:

• Kerbal Shuttle Orbiter, while it's a beautiful shuttle, it adds a lot of parts (I like to keep my ships as stock as possible)
  
• Gimbal Auto Trim, it feels a little 'cheaty'.
  

And that should be it! Like I said, I periodically install Infernal Robotics and KAS, just because they're such great mods. I also occasionally will pick up KSP Interstellar, as it is fantastic as well.

[Tw1]

Amusingly enough the only roughly appropriate antonym (opposite) of 'mod' I could find was "unfashionable" so - "fine, I'm going to make an unfashionable KSP install".

That's interesting. From the use of it as (ironically outdated) slang for Modern, as in current, "up to date"? In video game context, it's more short for modification (a change). Technically, it is also a noun, meaning it can't really have an opposite.

But enough linguistically babble.

I ended up dropping hybrid ions once it started changing its models- I wanted to stick to stock engines only, and this would save memory. I did keep some of the origional larger electic equipment though. I also recently dropped TTmultiwheels- it wasn't getting much use, then the version I had became outdated and broke, and I decided to use the memory for something else.

The ones I won't do without are Lack Luster Labs, an older version of Spherical and Toroidal Tanks and Extraplanetary Launchpads, as these make up my moon bases. Also, the Boat Propeller is essential to my AAR.

KAS is the most useful mod ever, that's staying. Umm, lots of others too?

Edited April 28, 2014 by Tw1

[LethalDose]

The only one I've dropped that I can think of was RT2. Didn't directly have any trouble with it (and I really liked the layer of complexity it added), but without official 0.23.5 support, I'm taking a break from using it until it's got official support again.

[Liowen]

For me I have mods I try to keep the mods to a minimum not so much that my system cannot handle them, but rather I have never been fond of moding games until there is no in game option. Here is my current list of mods I am using:

KData I use this mainly so I do not need to look to map mode to see my periapsis and apoapsis, and to a lesser degree what biome I am currently over.

Science Alert I mainly got this one to aid in getting me out of warp to collect science, it is nice to not have to hunt on my crafts for the right experiments.

City and lights (the name eludes me currently) Hey nothing wrong with having nice things to look at in the game, at least until SQUAD puts them in game on their own.

Mechjeb While I had this installed to help me with docking I have since learned to do that on my own so this will become less needed now. Unlike many I do not use the other functions of it to make my ships, yet I have gone to other planets and returned.

Docking Port Alignment Indicator I finally was able to figure out docking with. THANK YOU NAVYFISH!

Toolbar This one is used to hold a few of the above mods, and keeps a nice neat UI (Something I like).

Protractor I have this to help me setup for my interplanetary missions, though if I used Kerbal Alarm Clock I may not need this after that point.

*Mods I am considering*

Chatterer I think this would be kind of funny to have voices in my head....well other than those already there of course.

Better Than Manned While this is many mods I am considering playing this in .24 to give myself a better challenge, although I may not use a few of the mods in it as I do not like them.

Kerbal Alarm CLock I have it downloaded but have yet to put it into play, and honestly I do not know why.

*Mods I will not use for the foreseeable future*

KER I can make ships that do the missions I want successfully so far without it, and until this changes I will not install it.

Mechjeb Yes I know I currently have this one installed, however it has been broken since .23.5, it will most likely be removed from my mod folder soon.

Kethane Sorry this one currently does not seem appealing to me, but I do like watching others use it.

Advanced Robotics (I think) Too many things needed to be launch to do missions. I like to roleplay a bit, but this is too much even for me.

I am sure there are others I might like and others I might not, but this is my current thoughts on the ones I see. I know that my views on KER are far from popular, but I do well without it. Even if my ship hasn't got the fuel it just means I have to do a rescue mission.

"Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better." -Samuel Beckett

[Liowen]

Things I couldn't do without:

None! At least no mods.

Alexmoon's launch window planner, on the other hand, I don't know how to make an interplanetary transfer without.

Protractor is what I use for this it helps get the angle you need, but still leaves it planning in your hands. To me this is more realistic and I do not need to access an outside website to do them.

[NecroBones]

Here's the list of mods I've tried, but then removed:

HyperEdit - Probably cool and useful, but I've made it this far without it. I installed it and never used it.

AutoAsparagus - I thought it would be a time-saver, but it never did quite the right thing, so away it went.

ISA MapSat - Pretty cool, but I was disappointed that only the active ship would do mapping. I preferred ScanSat for that reason.

KAS - Awesome mod, but I never remembered to take spare parts with me, and never needed to remove or relocate an existing part. I also didn't want to become dependent on any mod-based winches or robotic arms.

Kethane - I may come back to this one. I installed it, planning to look into using the parts later, but didn't want to see that hex-grid on top of everything. It's probably configurable, I'm guessing. But so far I've done OK without it.

KJR - Awesome mod, but after 0.23.5, the stock joint physics were good enough for me.

KWRocketry - I like it, but I mainly wanted it for a the fairings. For some reason, the parts stopped loading after I rebuilt my PC, and ultimately it didn't seem worth it to make my designs non-stock.

RCS Sounds - Neat, but it didn't fully sync with the animations, so it got distracting.

Tweakable Everything - Cool, but caused some stability issues in the VAB, and I didn't use it often enough.

Edited April 28, 2014 by NecroBones

[Zeroignite]

Does SundayPunch count as unfashionable? That was removed due to the stock game catching up and the mod going end-of-life

Hooligan Labs Airships I keep waffling on; it comes in and out of my games. On the one hand airships are neat, on the other they are all kinds of fiddly to design properly and aren't exactly fast or easy to lift sensibly.

Protractor I now find a bit superfluous due to the AlexMoon transfer calculator, so it's been relic'd.

Paintable Rockets was awesome but I spent more time fiddling with color schemes in the VAB than actually designing or flying anything.

Chatterer I removed after realizing I set it to off most of the time, and after having sudden SSTV transmissions make me jump.

Edited April 28, 2014 by Zeroignite

[blizzy78]

[ETA: Oh man, I can't believe I made such a huge typo in the title :-( ]

You can edit the thread title by editing in the "advanced" editing mode, or by double-clicking the thread title in the forum view (where you can see all the other threads.)

[godefroi]

My list looks a lot like NecroBones':

AutoAsparagus - Didn't really work right most of the time, and with the new SLS parts, I do a lot less asparagusing.

ISA MapSat - Meh. It gives you a map. I hear ScanSat is newer and better, but I haven't tried it. If I used RT2 (and I'm considering it), I'd probably use ScanSat.

Protractor - Wasn't any better at getting me interplanetary intercepts than MechJeb, which is to say, dismal. AlexMoon's planner is MUCH MUCH better, and the only thing I've ever struggled with since starting to use it is transfers between Jool's moons. Which are hard.

Kethane - I installed it to ease long-term operations at distant planets, but I ended up removing it, because now, I can put 250 tons of fuel into orbit around just about any planet whenever I want, so it's not worth the hassle of sending refineries and fuel transports and fuel storage facilities and ...

KAS - In theory, it's great, but for me it was mostly useful in conjunction with Kethane, so when I dropped Kethane, I didn't really have a need for it anymore...

Thinks I kept include MechJeb, VOID (especially the awesome HUD), KAC, ProceduralFairings.

[Spartwo]

I can only manage 3-4 mods altogether. I use:

-Hyperedit(Testing things which weigh 4.5k tons)

-Mechjeb(2 hour Ion burn manually!)

-Kerbpaint(Looks good)

-One other mod(at the moment burn together, because the mk2 cockpit IVA is gone)

[Boomerang]

Since you're interested in getting rid of things, I'd vote for RT2 out of your core mods. Maybe you've had better luck with it, but my experience with it is that it breaks the game more often than not. After a few major bug fixes, it finally just started locking up my game, so I ditched it. Made room for other things. YMMV though, of course.

[Red Iron Crown]

I got rid of all parts-adding mods a few versions back. Long loading times and memory issues, plus a half-dozen variations of every part drove me there.

Since doing so, I find it more interesting to try challenges (even if most of the time I don't submit because other entries are so much better). And sharing craft is much easier, everyone has the parts I use.

[Iforgotthis]

I recently installed Interstellar, but I'm not too sure on what I think of it. Whilst the new technology is great, the whole mod seems very career orientated (I much prefer sandbox) and overall it's a lot of hassle for what it is.

Opinions?

[colmo]

I recently installed Interstellar, but I'm not too sure on what I think of it. Whilst the new technology is great, the whole mod seems very career orientated (I much prefer sandbox) and overall it's a lot of hassle for what it is.

Opinions?

Interstellar is not a mod you add to an install to spice things up. It's a mod you build everything else around - it impacts so much of the way you play the game, and adds so much content, you have to do it that way, or else it becomes clutter.

[BudgetHedgehog]

Mechjeb Yes I know I currently have this one installed, however it has been broken since .23.5, it will most likely be removed from my mod folder soon.

No it hasn't, it's been working fine. What's broken is your ability to download the update for it

Anyway, my dropped mods include:

Most things that add science parts (L-Tech, DMagic et al). I find I complete the tree far too easily with them.

Interstellar - as mentioned above, unless you plan around it, it's clutter. I could never get it to work right and got frustrated at my lack of knowedge of it and by the end of it, the only bits I was using was the radiators and that's only because KSPI also adds waste heat.. Shame though, I really enjoyed trying to figure it out.

B9 - not much of a plane guy, the parts are all Structural, some are obsolete, some are bugged (this was before I found the 0.23 fixes for it), doesn't fit in with other parts well.

Chatterer and Soundtrack Editor - I usually play with KSP really quiet or on mute so they were pointless being there. Both very good mods though, on the occasions I had the volume up, I did enjoy them. But I had the volume down more often than not, and soon after I downloaded them (from KSPRC), I started getting more and more crashes so they were among the first to go.

And probably some more.

[Superfluous J]

I've dropped very few mods without solid replacements.

Universe Replacer I traded up for Texture Replacer.

TAC Fuel Balancer lost out to GoodSpeed Fuel Pump.

VOID didn't live for an hour before being replaced by Kerbal Engineer Redux.

I uninstalled Targetron because I tended to find it easier to find stuff in Map Mode, but have recently installed it again to see how it's changed.

I uninstalled Action Group Manager because though I love the idea, I found myself never using it. And it had a nasty bug that deleted stored science. This bug has been fixed, but I've not yet felt the need for it so haven't bothered reinstalling.

I think that's it.

[Iforgotthis]

Interstellar is not a mod you add to an install to spice things up. It's a mod you build everything else around - it impacts so much of the way you play the game, and adds so much content, you have to do it that way, or else it becomes clutter.

I have only just began to realise this. As soon as I figure out how to uninstall it safely, I most likely will. I love the features it adds, especially the ocean and atmosphere composition equipment, it's just such a hassle. I wonder whether there is a mod specifically designed for ocean/atmosphere/soil composition read outs. I'd definitely get it...