Automatic ship welding to get rid of lag once and for all, unlimited part count.

[SpaceXray]

I think the way KSP is made right now limits the size and complexity of many ships. Since physics have to be calculated for every single part in a ship, it really limits you imagination.

i suggest keeping the VAB and SPH, but when you build a ship from 100 parts, they weld in less than 5. You combine multiple parts wi different functions into one. A pod with and engine and fuel tank attached becomes a single part ship with right-clock options like "disable engine" and fuel transfer. The current masses of each part are combined on welding. This is very simple to achieve and would make the game run 90% faster!

[allmhuran]

Unfortunately that would also make them essentially indestructible, removing one of the major challenges from the game.

[Mitchz95]

It would also kind of ruin the game's semi-realistic physics. Crashing a plane made of "4" parts won't make a very big debris field.

EDIT: Ninja'd.

[Justin Kerbice]

At least similar/identical parts could be merged into a bigger one (3 z-1k batteries banks => 1 part, multiple wing connector, 10 for example, become a single one). I think it would not spoiled too much explosion/collision effect but could seriously help.

And to avoid "cheating", there could be a maximum amount of similar parts welded together:

ex: for wing connector, max = 5

so 12 connectors = 1 (5) + 1 (5) + 1 (2) groups, 4 times less parts.

[Red Iron Crown]

Welding parts won't eliminate lag, we'll just complain about lag with much bigger ships. Same with multithreaded physics that would allow higher part counts, we'd be complaining about lag at 5,000 parts instead of 500.

There's a variation of Parkinson's Law here: Ship size will expand to use available computing power.

[Sky_walker]

So let's sit down and stop doing anything. Cause you know - people can never be satisfied.

[Red Iron Crown]

So let's sit down and stop doing anything. Cause you know - people can never be satisfied.

That wasn't exactly what I meant, but I can see how you might read it that way. More of an observation that we build up to our acceptable lag level, wherever that is. So we should be careful that the changes made to reduce lag don't compromise the game in other ways.

Multithreading physics is good in that it allows bigger ships without compromise. Part welding I'm not as sure of. While it does reduce physics load, it also compromises the physical model of the craft that makes up a large part of the challenge of design and construction.

[vexx32]

I think we should focus less on solutions that make sacrifices, and more on solutions that actually make a good effort to solve the original problem(s).

[Darnok]

Welding parts won't eliminate lag, we'll just complain about lag with much bigger ships. Same with multithreaded physics that would allow higher part counts, we'd be complaining about lag at 5,000 parts instead of 500.

There's a variation of Parkinson's Law here: Ship size will expand to use available computing power.

I wouldn't complain much for lagg starting over 500 parts, for lags starting when I reach 5000 parts... LOL I would forget about lag

Right now I have laggs when I hit 200