[1.0.5 - Alpha 6] Dang It! (12 september 2015)

[autumnalequinox]

Ahh, now I know why I've had no failures of late. Dang it! I guess I'd better install the hotfix.

One thing I love about this mod is that it makes it harder to get away with using unmanned probes for everything. I use TAC-LS, MKS/OKS, RemoteTech2, KAS, and I'm thinking about adding Snacks! My life-support requirements make me reluctant to use Kerbals, but Dang It and KAS require me to use Kerbals. So there's some nice tension there. For those of you using life-support mods along with Dang It, what's your thinking about the ratio of manned to unmanned flights?

I seem to be going nearly totally realistically now, with unmanned missions being the bulk of my exploration, and manned being huge wow afairs with tons of planning behind them (I also use TAC life support, so I can't just fire-and-forget my poor Kerblings). But long unmanned probes tend to eventually get wracked with so many critical failures they become useless... just like real life!!!

Of course u can't beat science brought back, so i tend to launch 2-4 unmanned missions (orbiter, orbiter with more advanced packages like scanSAT, then lander, then rover or second lander) to scout a world before the manned mission. Then I begin to build permanent infrastructure (emergency station, research lab, OKS self-sustaining) and finally mining/colonization.

These wonderful mods totally turn this into an exploration/colonization strategy game, which is SWEEEET. Why didn't anybody think of this before??????!?!?

[CatastrophicFailure]

I'm still waiting for exploding engines myself. When you start throwing in realism mods like this, life support, and especially Kerbal Construction Time, those launch abort systems really start to have meaning. But I've yet to have a launch failure that really needed one. (I seem to get nothing but leaky tanks)

[Ippo]

Afraid to disappoint you sir, but engines won't explode, they just shut down :/

In fact, there is no explosive failure (... yet).

I encourage you to share the values if you edit the .cfg files, it will help me balance it

[CatastrophicFailure]

Afraid to disappoint you sir, but engines won't explode, they just shut down :/

In fact, there is no explosive failure (... yet).

I encourage you to share the values if you edit the .cfg files, it will help me balance it

Thats why I said "still waiting":sticktongue:

Lol but seriously, some sort of multiple failure system like that could really add some intensity. One part failing (with a good initial design) is more like an annoyance, a cascade of failures ala Apollo 13 would create some real "oh crap how do I get otta this one??" Moments. And also because EXPLOSIONS!

[Ippo]

Explosions will come, but will be optional.

Cascading failures... dunno. In the beginning I didn't like the idea, but now I'm starting to think that *maybe*, if it were well designed, it might make sense.

What we really need is a way to cause failures on unloaded ships...

[CatastrophicFailure]

Ditto to both. As you said, systemic failure would have to be "right." An engine exploding at the back of the ship disabling the parachute at the front wouldn't be. An exploding monoprop tank that takes out a thruster, a battery, and an antenna all next to each other, oh and incidentally your nearby engine is now more likely to explode if you try to use it, now THAT would be some intense game play.

And is probably a heckuvalot harder to code than I can comprehend.

[Ippo]

And is probably a heckuvalot harder to code than I can comprehend.

Glad to see we are on the same page

[Mandelbrot]

Thank you very much for this mod. It became one of my favorites as soon as saw it and understood how much more depth an aging system for spacecraft adds to the game. Incentivising redundancy, adding realism and depth to long-term missions and to maintaining persistent assets in space. With budgets in, it now seems essential for balance. So thank you. Like DRE and FAR, Dang It! is basically required for me to get the most out of KSP for the foreseeable future.

[Axl'Wolf'Lipid]

Hello.I love this mod,but i need to know ho to set the default spare parts to zero in the VAB instead of the full load.And yes,i know about the right click

Thanks.

[Ippo]

Mandelbrot: thanks! Glad I helped

AxlWolf: you need to edit the SpareParts.cfg file to set the default amount to zero, but leave the max amount to what I set. I'm on vacation right now, I'll make the configs for you when I come back.

[Axl'Wolf'Lipid]

I've already tryed editing the spareparts.cfg and it didn't work.Everything remain maxed out.I will try to modify the max amount then and see what happen.

If i do something wrong i will reinstall your mod

EDIT:

Not even changing the "maxamount" work...

Edited September 9, 2014 by Axl'Wolf'Lipid

[Ippo]

Ok, you need to edit this line in the SpareParts.cfg file. Leave the max amount alone and change only amount.

You need to edit the amount value for each node (you see that I defined 7 nodes, one for each crew capacity value): edit the amount for each of them.

After that you will have to close and relaunch KSP, and then you should see the parts in the VAB with the amount you set. Hopefully.

[Axl'Wolf'Lipid]

Already did.Nothing work...

KSP is problematic lately for me

I will try a reinstall.

EDIT:

Made it work:

I've deinstalled DangIt,started KSP,exited the game then reinstalled the mod with the value already modified.

I can die happy now.

Thanks.

Edited September 9, 2014 by Axl'Wolf'Lipid

[Justin Kerbice]

@Ippo: just got an idea for a "not too hard to create" textures change according to state of part during their life time.

You may use parts of Firespitter textureswitch module (with snjo's permisssion of course) and using the lifetime of the part as a trigger to define (=the next action of FSTS module) the texture (+ map(s)) to use. So it could be something like:

brand new (shiny/clean) -> 1st flight (dusty, scratched) -> reentry (burned)

-> long time in space (damage due to repeated heat/cooling cycle)

-> long time on a planet with water (rusty, if relevant)

...

The same also apply for damages like fire (electrical or chemical), fuel leak, ...

[Ippo]

Well Justin, that is a really cool idea!

I can see a big problem, aka "ippo doesn't know SolidFuel about textures and firespitter". It's a really cool idea though, I will keep it on the back burner for when I will have the skills for it

[Daishi]

Well Justin, that is a really cool idea!

I can see a big problem, aka "ippo doesn't know SolidFuel about textures and firespitter". It's a really cool idea though, I will keep it on the back burner for when I will have the skills for it

I've just jumped into Firespitter to replace our current animation module (Stupid_Chris has given it up ), and it is pretty straight forward once you get things arranged properly in Unity. Textureswitching is probably just as easy. But considering how hard it is to get hold of the UVs for the stock parts (and how touchy it is to extract the texture maps to work on, some RGB channels just disappear on export), it might be tricky to get multiple textures going that are visually consistent to the base game. And of course it will bloat the games memory footprint, doubling it for every level of damage you want to include :|

[Ippo]

I have somewhat understood some of the things you said.

Maybe one day... Right now I don't even have unity installed (you don't need it for a partless plugin), and I have no idea what a UV map is

I had thought about how to match the textures to the stock ones (and md parts too), I think the only feasible approach would be transparent overlays rescaled procedurally... I don't even know if it's possible though

[Daishi]

I have somewhat understood some of the things you said.

Maybe one day... Right now I don't even have unity installed (you don't need it for a partless plugin), and I have no idea what a UV map is

I had thought about how to match the textures to the stock ones (and md parts too), I think the only feasible approach would be transparent overlays rescaled procedurally... I don't even know if it's possible though

Hah sorry - I get carried away. A UV map essentially tells the renderer what part of the texturemap gets assigned to what polygon in the model. So to do a nice job making different levels of worn out textures, it pays to have an "overlay" of the UV frame so you have a good idea which part of the texture map corresponds to each part of the model.

Without this it's pretty much just guesswork, and one of the only ways to get a UV frame is to decompile Squad assets and that's kind of a grey area. Blackheart has done a pretty cool job re-working them though, that could be someone you could ask

[DonLorenzo]

I'm not sure if this is the right place to put it, but over in the Challenges forum EllBristow has based a 'hardcore' kind of challenge around this mod and I'm doing videos of my participation. Currently up to episode 6, where a Duna mission built for reliability (lots of parts and redundancy) is taking shape. I'll leave that here, but feel free to redact if you feel it inappropriate. Having lots of fun with the mod so far!

edit: adding in the next episode, which has lots and lots of failures en route to Duna!

Edited September 22, 2014 by DonLorenzo

[Ippo]

Glad to see you are having fun

I'll take a look when I have time... who knows, maybe I might even take part

[RoverDude]

Hey Ippo, two questions.

First - where is the resource definition for SpareParts? I'm doing some retooling on the MKS side for 0.25 and now is as good a time as any to help everyone out and have one less resource name to deal with - so I was going to replace my ReplacementParts resource with SpareParts. Big thing will be cost, since they can be manufactured and have to make sure there is no weirdness (cost structure in MKS is loosely tied to how Taniwha did EL because we have a few resourced in common). Essentially, I'd like to add SpareParts to CRP (same way I do with TAC-LS and Universal Storage) as it helps with resource conflicts, and my preference is to be neighborly

Second - any chance of getting GitHub releases as a secondary download option since you're on GitHub anyway?

(edit) Also - let me know how tied you are to density/etc - right now all of my resources are mass-neutral wrt manufacturing, and it would be nice to not only allow folks to make spareparts with their MKS stuff, but to have them interchangeable (but I would need to make sure there were no weird conservation of mass violations along the way).

Thanks!

Edited October 5, 2014 by RoverDude

[Ippo]

Hey Ippo, two questions.

First - where is the resource definition for SpareParts?

Here it is

I'm doing some retooling on the MKS side for 0.25 and now is as good a time as any to help everyone out and have one less resource name to deal with - so I was going to replace my ReplacementParts resource with SpareParts. Big thing will be cost, since they can be manufactured and have to make sure there is no weirdness (cost structure in MKS is loosely tied to how Taniwha did EL because we have a few resourced in common). Essentially, I'd like to add SpareParts to CRP (same way I do with TAC-LS and Universal Storage) as it helps with resource conflicts, and my preference is to be neighborly

Sure! I love the idea behind CRP, and I'll be damned if I don't support it when I have the chance.

Just one thing: is it a necessity for MKS to have them pumpable? You will notice that I set mine to no flow, because this is a mod designed to inconvenience the user and so I took all the opportunities I had to make them uncomfortable. I'd like to keep them non transferrable, unless it's necessary for you to transfer them.

I'll poke you on IRC, I'll have to ask you what I need to do on my end

Second - any chance of getting GitHub releases as a secondary download option since you're on GitHub anyway?

Yeah, possibly. Not a huge fan of multiple downloads, but I guess a backup won't hurt

(edit) Also - let me know how tied you are to density/etc [...]

They have all been pulled out of my aft section and needed to be revisited anyway, so no worries here

[RoverDude]

Here it is

Sure! I love the idea behind CRP, and I'll be damned if I don't support it when I have the chance.

Just one thing: is it a necessity for MKS to have them pumpable? You will notice that I set mine to no flow, because this is a mod designed to inconvenience the user and so I took all the opportunities I had to make them uncomfortable. I'd like to keep them non transferrable, unless it's necessary for you to transfer them.

I'll poke you on IRC, I'll have to ask you what I need to do on my end

Yeah, possibly. Not a huge fan of multiple downloads, but I guess a backup won't hurt

They have all been pulled out of my aft section and needed to be revisited anyway, so no worries here

Thank you good sir for being awesome. Let me play with the transfer bits and see what I can do to keep them nice and inconvenient.

I assume right now you do EVA-only transfer of parts via plugin correct?

FYI density is at 0.0189, cost at 63. These are both based on the combined costs and densities of the raw materials (I used Taniwha's Cost/Density for EL as the benchmark, so it tends to drive everything else).

The nifty side effect is that if people have an MKS base plus DangIt! they will be able to make their own SpareParts

EDIT: So the one thing I will need to sort will be transfers from manufacturing. From a design standpoint, especially as you add containers, what would be your intent for the mechanism players would use to resupply their ships with spare parts?

Edited October 5, 2014 by RoverDude

[Ippo]

Thank you good sir for being awesome. Let me play with the transfer bits and see what I can do to keep them nice and inconvenient.

I assume right now you do EVA-only transfer of parts via plugin correct?

Exactly: specifically, I just add a new resource to the part of the EVA kerbal (see here for details), but the resource is set to no transfer.

That might be a problem for your manufacturing, since I guess you'll be using a RequestResource to move the parts around. If you find a quick workaround, great, otherwise don't sweat it, it's not a big deal for me if we gain in compatibility and standardization.

FYI density is at 0.0189, cost at 63. These are both based on the combined costs and densities of the raw materials (I used Taniwha's Cost/Density for EL as the benchmark, so it tends to drive everything else).

It's even more punishing than the values I chose! Great

The nifty side effect is that if people have an MKS base plus DangIt! they will be able to make their own SpareParts

This sounds really awesome MKS is really fantastic, although I dropped it temporarily because better atmospheres is crashy enough for me without MKS on the side. I'll re-add it as soon as I switch to linux

EDIT: So the one thing I will need to sort will be transfers from manufacturing. From a design standpoint, especially as you add containers, what would be your intent for the mechanism players would use to resupply their ships with spare parts?

The idea was to force them to move them manually on EVA, but as I said above, I'm more than willing to drop this if it means integrating with CRP and MKS.

[Ippo]

...

I was watching the second video, and the part from 30 to 34 minutes is terrifying :S

Failures just aren't supposed to be this frequent - although I have to say that you have been extremely unlucky, in my current save I had ONE leak, period (although I haven't gone interplanetary yet).

Anyway, thanks for your feedback

P.S: I forgot to add one small correction. When you said "they are supposed to last for years", you are half right - they are supposed to decay in years, but the reliability can still be terrible. For example, lights, that are the less reliable part, but they decay very very slowly.

Edited October 6, 2014 by Ippo