Realism in KSP

[Sky_walker]

While I agree that a lot of the challenge can be mitigated with a better gui and removal of the "oddities" as you put it, I must ask you, and I'm sorry if I'm getting off-topic, but where in world did you get the idea that ascending till 100km and then making a 45 degree turn is in any way a good idea? Or did you just mean 10km? (even so it can be done better), if so I take your point as being about the soupy atmosphere.

lol You got me! It should be 10km of course I edited post to correct it.

[Guest]

I don't think Squad should make it as real as possible, they should make it as fun and entertaining as possible.

Two words: KSP Edu. I certainly wouldn't want kids learning about rockets using KSP in the current form. They would have a general idea about physics of rocket launch, and hundreds of small misconceptions and design ideas that are just plain wrong. The aerodynamic model is simply bad. Patched conics system is overtly simplified, especially given that it is not only possible to make N-body simulation in KSP, but it has been half-done already. By a single math student, no less. There is no life support nor aerodynamic heating, no radiation problems and both jet and rocket engines have big realism issues. KSP is not pure fantasy, and realism would actually improve the game greatly. Recently, I wanted to show a friend a B9-made plane. I couldn't get it off the ground, no matter how I tried. Later, I installed FAR, and designed a flying, working plane in a couple of minutes. That's because with FAR, you can use common sense and actual aerodynamic knowledge.

[MisterDoubleSevens]

I'm just going to list the biggest gripes I have about realism, because I see that some of these haven't actually been mentioned.

1. Nuclear engines are underpowered and use LFO instead of LiqFuel + fissile fuel (for the fission reaction).

2. Reaction wheels are overpowered.

3. Ion engines are overpowered.

4. The air is more akin to water than air.

5. Planets are too small, too high density, and too close together.

6. Kerbals don't immediately die upon EVA on Eve or Moho.

7. Random failures don't happen.

8. Career mode gives out funds like candy.

9. Asparagus Staging is a thing.

10. Fuselages have fuel in them and wings don't.

11. Jets are overpowered.

12. There is no re-entry heating.

13. Kerbals are somehow immune to G-forces.

14. No life support.

15. Asteroids have no gravity whatsoever.

And now, I'm going to say this:

I want Realism Mode to be an option when starting a new game, that way people who don't like realism aren't forced to deal with it, but it'll be there and fully supported (unlike mods, which tend to break every major update).

Edited August 28, 2014 by MisterDoubleSevens
Clarifying #1, removed #16 because I didn't realize RTGs work off decay, not reactions.

[John FX]

Before we get things like life support and other features that can make your mission fail without planning we need the tools to be able to plan a mission (hopefully these will be in the upcoming mission control building). The ethos of trial and error just won`t work under a more realistic game. We would need something like KER for a Dv readout for example long before life support.

It will be that or the game will only be played by people who love spreadsheets or who can remember the transfer windows in their head or who can calculate Dv just by looking at the parts.

I imagine the target audience is meant to be more wide than that.

[Sky_walker]

The ethos of trial and error just won`t work under a more realistic game.

It will work perfectly fine. Realism got nothing to deal with whatever trial and error works or not.

Realistic consequences of a failure - like a realistic balance of income and expenses real space agencies have - might change that, but that still depends on an implementation details (i.e. currently we have a system in which bankruptcy is impossible, so there is nothing there to limit trial and error, no matter the amount of errors - your decisions don't really matter, you still will have cash to work with).

[The Mechanic]

I played about a year of KSP with the stock aerodynamic model but now with .24.2 I wanted to try something new so I installed FAR (without KIDS for now, I might add that if I start a new game again). The largest payload for now was a small vessel based on the HGR two-kerbal capsule for getting science from Minmus and I must say that - at least for me - FAR makes quite a difference.

While it does take you less dV to reach orbit it nonetheless is not really easier if you are not used to FAR. My first rockets with FAR were dancing ballet in the air before being subjected to unplanned rapid disassembly. While I always made somewhat "classical" launch vehicles FAR made me put some more thought into building and flying. And over the time you get better and the rockets stop flipping.

Another thing about FAR that I really like are the aerodynamic failures. Yes, it is frustrating if your rocket flips and falls apart for the third time. But on the other hand it really fits the "spirit" of KSP in my opinion. There are the mistakes which - I guess - everyone makes. Like not strutting SRBs and so on. You fail. You redesign. You try again. Maybe it is better, maybe not. And with a realistic-ish model you can go to wikipedia or take a book from the library and read about design principles for planes and rockets.

So, yes, I would say that KSP would benefit from a better aerodynamics model and I would disagree with those saying that it becomes so much harder for newbies. It will be different but not necessarily that much harder.

The same thing goes in my opinion for dV and TWR readouts. NASA didn't send a manned mission to the Moon without knowing how much dV their lander has. Yes, I know, KSP is not NASA.

But if you ask me what I would find more frustrating as new player, designing and flying a mission to the Mun and noticing that my ascend stage does not have enough dV/a too low TWR or my rocket flipping and being subjected to unplanned rapid disassembly on launch because of better aerodynamics I would say the former is more frustrating.

The former is a design mistake because I do not get the numbers which is annoying. It is like an RTS not telling you how much ammunition your troops have left. (Not a perfect comparison.)

The latter is a real design and/or piloting mistake which only I am responsible for. The same goes for placing engines in the wrong place or crashing into the Mun at 120m/s because of bad piloting.

KSP doesn't need to be 100% realistic but I found that for me the mods adding little bits of realism like DRE, FAR and TAC-LS really add to the game experience because they add a new layer of possible failures and things you have to consider. But it also adds a new feeling of success if you return from the Mun the first time with those mods and life support runs out before you even enter the atmosphere and you don't know if your periapsis is set right for direct re-entry but you make it and return Jebediah and all the precious science to Kerbin safely.

[Motokid600]

I was always under the impression that Squad chose Kerbals over humans is simply because you kill them.. like.. alot lol. Killing humans like kerbals doesn't exactly paint the best picture for a space program. So you gotta preserve that cartoony feel in that reguard. ( although I think a kerbals head on a human scale body would look really good )

As for realism. I'm with regex. 1:1 IMO.

[Geschosskopf]

The people who keep pushing the extreme realism agenda as if it's pre-ordained, and that the devs are letting themselves down by not doing so, seriously need to take a step back and look at the larger picture.

NOTE: Read the following with the knowledge that at present, I play KSP with life support, DRE, FAR or NEAR, and various other things. It's just a phase I'm going through for a change of pace. I really find KSP much more enjoyable as stock. I am by NO means a realism-monger. Quite the opposite.

-----------------------------------

Anyway, I totally agree with the OP.

Given the free availability of scads of mods to "realify" all the aspects of the game that the realism-mongers complain about, why must they insist that KSP incorporate any of these things as stock? As things stand right now, each person can play the game however he wants. If he doesn't want "realism" getting in the way of the parts of the game he considers fun, then he can go stock. If he for some strange reason actually thinks "realism" is fun, then he can get whatever mods he likes to make that happen. So everybody should be happy, and KSP thus appeals to a wide audience, so more people will buy it, so Squad gets more money, so KSP will have a longer life. Isn't this a good thing? What can you possibly find to complain about?

Now, realism-mongers being realism-mongers, they'll find something to complain about anyway. But from what I can tell, they can only raise quibbles, such as "KSP can't be taken seriously until it has all this stuff as stock." Or perhaps they complain that the "realifying" mods can only do so much with the base game, and the result is still unsatisfactory. To THEM. To these folks, I say the following:

KSP was designed from the ground up as an entertaining GAME. It's supposed to give the general idea without being rigorous. It was never intended to be a SIMULATION, so will never become one unless it's totally rebuilt, which probably will never happen. HOWEVER, there's this other game called Orbiter, which has been around in various incarnations since the mid-80s. It has ALWAYS striven to be a rigorously realistic SIMULATION, designed from the ground up as such. And it has everything the KSP realism-mongers could possibly want, and probably quite a few things they haven't even thought of. It also has a very big, long-established community and more mods than KSP.

So if you want true realism in your space game, I strongly suggest that you go play Orbiter and leave KSP alone. They're apples and oranges, intended to be entirely different things for entirely different markets. Neither can do what the other does, and neither should. It's good that both exist. Let them each stick to what they're good at and leave it at that.

Personally, I played Orbiter in all its incarnations for nearly 30 years. Then I kicked it to the curb when KSP came along, because I find KSP to be a lot more fun. Orbiter is more like work to me.

[Red Iron Crown]

I read some comments in here stating that KSP is not meant to be a realistic simulation, but that doesn't seem to be Squad's stance:

Fully-fledged, Physics-based Flight Simulation ensures everything will fly (and crash) as it should.

From here.

Of course, like any recreational simulator some compromises to utter realism must be made to make the game fun and accessible. But to claim that "KSP is not a simulator" or "it's not meant to be realistic" is just false. If some part of the game can be made more realistic without compromising fun gameplay or making it impossibly complex, then why not?

[Sky_walker]

If some part of the game can be made more realistic without compromising fun gameplay or making it impossibly complex, then why not?

And here I'd like to remind that complexity is a direct function of how well does the game explain itself to the user.

[r4pt0r]

And here I'd like to remind that complexity is a direct function of how well does the game explain itself to the user.

Your post makes it seem like this game is impossible to play without a slide-rule or calculator. I came into KSP knowing nothing about orbital mechanics, and thinking it was completely reasonable for superman to throw things right into the sun from LEO, or that burning straight up to the mun is the best way to do it. You dont need any delta-v calculator to play. I have always played just slapping parts together, I learned that going straight up means coming straight down so you need to do a gravity turn. The game allows you to play more technically if you want, calculating dv and doing weight stuff or whatever, but that would be unfun tedium for me personally.

[Sky_walker]

Your post makes it seem like this game is impossible to play without a slide-rule or calculator.

If so, then please - read it again, cause it looks like you simply read something that I never wrote.

You dont need any delta-v calculator to play.

I never said that you need to nor that you should.

I have always played just slapping parts together, I learned that going straight up means coming straight down so you need to do a gravity turn.

You don't do a gravity turn.

It's one of the misconceptions that regex mentioned - one of the things that "KSP teaches wrong". What you are talking about is NOT a gravity turn. Fact that you do not fly straight up all the way doesn't mean that you make a gravity turn. It just means you make a turn, period.

The game allows you to play more technically if you want

No. It doesn't. Mods allow that. But the game itself - stock - does not.

[regex]

And it has everything the KSP realism-mongers could possibly want, and probably quite a few things they haven't even thought of.

There's no VAB/SPH in Orbiter. Also no native Linux client. That pretty much kills it for me, and I was seriously considering blowing this popsicle stand for something better.

Anyway, KSP doesn't need to be Orbiter, much as I personally think it really should aspire to do Orbiter better. What it needs to do is fix some glaring problems so that new and old players alike step into the simulation with an intuitive grasp of how things should work as the advertisement claims. They should be able to rely on proven math and be able to build rockets, and planes, that fly as they should.

E: Also this:

Oh, it's also good to see someone else who doesn't see an aerodynamic overhaul as a given. I thought I was the only one who expected it to be dropped.

I fully expect the KSP devs to drop some line like "it isn't fun. :(" to justify junking an aerodynamic overhaul in order to maintain the soup. THE SOUP ISNT FUN!

Edited August 28, 2014 by regex

[r_rolo1]

I fully expect the KSP devs to drop some line like "it isn't fun. :(" to justify junking an aerodynamic overhaul in order to maintain the soup. THE SOUP ISNT FUN!

Yeah, the devs sometimes seem to have a strange definition of fun :/ ( unless they mean it is not fun to code those features. That I might agree with ). Displaying needed intel on the screen? Unfun, too much numbers. Forcing the users to use protactors against their screens to know phase angles? Most surely fun, [wontfix] ...

Edited August 28, 2014 by r_rolo1

[tater]

I was always under the impression that Squad chose Kerbals over humans is simply because you kill them.. like.. alot lol. Killing humans like kerbals doesn't exactly paint the best picture for a space program. So you gotta preserve that cartoony feel in that reguard. ( although I think a kerbals head on a human scale body would look really good )

As for realism. I'm with regex. 1:1 IMO.

I keep hearing people talk about killing kerbals, but I've so far managed to kill exactly ONE, and it was honestly a mistake of the game engine (or my realizing that something could not be done). I grabbed a (empty tanks, with a pilot aboard) ship with a grabber, threw it into reentry parameters, and guided it in. I braked the grabber ship to make a separation to pilot both in, but the first reentry took a few seconds too long, and the 2d ship hit without me able to switch to it. I forgot I could not switch ships during reentry (which makes no sense, as the chute was already popped on the first, and there was literally nothing for me to do but wait).

I've been playing under 2 weeks. Stranded a few (all rescued later), killed 1 for the above reason. They are pretty much impossible to kill except by user error so far.

[tntristan12]

Having to guess the right staging you need to do something as basic as make orbit because the game flat out refuses to tell you your current delta-v is a blast. Who doesn't love to send the same rocket up over and over again, only to find out after another 15 wasted minutes that you still don't have enough fuel?

Seriously, the devs have made some truly baffling decisions based on what they think players will or will not enjoy. Like when they decided to junk in-situ resources, or when they declared that delta-v readouts were too realistic. Things like those and most of the other realistic touches mentioned here do nothing more than turn the current artificial difficulty into real difficulty that can actually be surmounted with enough thinking and practice.

As it stands now, the game is too difficult because it holds all the tools you need hostage, forcing you to rely on dozens of third part mods that more often than not will not work perfectly together and therefore cause bugs and crashes that completely ruin the experience. It's happened to me and I still don't want to get back into long term mission planning in KSP until the experience becomes more cohesive.

[tater]

For people claiming the game is too easy: Keep in mind that you are experienced players. New players to KSP really struggle to even get into orbit and understanding the game takes quite a while. I've tried to get many of my friends into KSP and all of them quickly give up due to it either taking too long to do anything or just being way too difficult.

I've been playing under 2 weeks (evenings, after the kids go to bed). I landed on the Mun in career mode the first night. Maybe I'll see what the kids think this weekend and give feedback for how an 8 year old does (I have to admit I loved the post about setting up FAR and a couple other mods before letting my kids touch it so they don't get the wrong idea about how things should roughly work, though).

[tater]

The delta v readout in the VAB is a particularly glaring error in terms of making it easy for people. A little "roadmap" icon (like the info, tracking, etc in map view) in the VAB might be a simple list of total dv needed to get different places under ideal conditions. It could even put a check next to places you could go (like success in a contract element) based on the current build.

[r_rolo1]

Yeah, the in-situ resources dropout is really baffling, because it would make much more for the game play time than any of the things they added after, and would give you real reasons to stay on the planets ( I mean, besides flag spam, another fun feature )... besides being more realistic ( I know, I know ... ): I assume that most of the people that plays KSP already heard that NASA; ESA, Roscosmos, JAXA and all the other space agencies spend a lot of their quite limited budget looking for resources out there ( like water in the Moon ). That must because of something, right ?

[Sky_walker]

It's obviously because they're looking for a new biome to grab a soil sample from.

Though KSP itself went to the great lengths trying to make that part as <s>hard</s> tedious as possible.

Edited August 28, 2014 by Sky_walker

[BlackAdder128]

I've been playing under 2 weeks (evenings, after the kids go to bed). I landed on the Mun in career mode the first night. Maybe I'll see what the kids think this weekend and give feedback for how an 8 year old does (I have to admit I loved the post about setting up FAR and a couple other mods before letting my kids touch it so they don't get the wrong idea about how things should roughly work, though).

It probably took me about a week's worth of playing to get to the Mun. I was stubborn and didn't google how to build a proper lander, so I had several instances of my lander falling over until I figured out how to do it right. Duna was also a pretty big challenge for me, initially, because I didn't have an intuitive grasp of how to build a proper rocket: I leaned towards bigger engines and moar boosters!

Then I watched a couple youtube videos and found a few decent references. But that was part of the fun for me: exploring how to build stuff without looking up the answers. Then later, I went and did the reading to figure out how things were supposed to work.

[tater]

My first lander was my orbiter with legs on it. Mk1 with chute, a stage separator (at the time I assumed the capsule needed to land alone at Kerbin), one of the double-sized tanks (or 2 of the 200s, can't remember), and the LV-909 engine I think. And 3 legs stuck on. I launched the lander alone first t decide how far the legs needed to be placed to just clear the nozzle. I realized I needed a wider lander later. Of course I also hated having the rocket look wrong at first, and most KSP rockets need a fairing to be even remotely plausible looking...

I had no ladder, and didn't realize how high I could jump/fly on EVA, so I didn't do an EVA (I was so tilted on the 1st one that I honestly think had I hit EVA the weight of Jeb hanging off would have tipped it over easily).

[Sky_walker]

Mk1 with chute, a stage separator (at the time I assumed the capsule needed to land alone at Kerbin), one of the double-sized tanks (or 2 of the 200s, can't remember), and the LV-909 engine I think.

One of these cases when game punishes you for playing it in a realistic way.

[tater]

One of these cases when game punishes you for playing it in a realistic way.

Yeah. All my first builds had nosecones on the SRBs, for example.

[sal_vager]

All this talk on realism has got me thinking....

I'm not entirely sure that realism is what's best for KSP, this might not be easy to describe but what would make KSP better in my opinion would be more accuracy.

Orbiter has realism, but if KSP was as complex and realistic as orbiter it'd lose that pick-up-and-play fun factor, but what KSP does do, despite being simplified and omitting many real-world aspects, should be as accurately portrayed as possible.

This would keep the game being fun, as "real-world" physics can be just as enjoyable as "near-enough" physics if not more so, and would be far more valuable as a teaching tool, as a stepping stone to teaching more complex things about space travel and exploration.

Adding life support, radar, speed-of-light communication and occlusion (examples), while cool, should take a back seat to making what KSP does do as "right" as possible without losing that fun factor.

Edited August 28, 2014 by sal_vager