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[WIP] NOS Tech Space Structure Extension (NT-SSX) [Alpha Release 0.2 Oct 3 2014]


noonespecial

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NTSSX 0.2 Alpha Release

Changes:

Fixed a bug where Mesh/Node changes did not persist from the VAB to Launch.

Added TweakScale

Required (and included):

JSIPartUtilities by Mihara.

TweakScale by Biotronics

Recommended (and NOT included):

Connected Living Spaces by codepoet.

***Kerbal Stuff Download***

Included in this release:

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Any ideas, suggestions, or requests... please please please post a comment :D

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Edited by noonespecial
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i like the hubs but could you make a habitation module type thing?

I might do something alone those lines, but don't have anything currently planned. Most of these parts are (very) loosely based off the ship from 2010 and stock parts that I feel need tweaking. KSO, Fustek, Porkjet, and many others already have excellent habitation modules. Do you have an idea for something specific?

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I know this may be an odd thing to say, but have you considered modeling wedgelike or more futuristic structures for station parts? We have oodles and oodles of trusses, connectors, bits, and bobs. What I am thinking are more...inline with OKS functionality, but on the scale of a full on space station. Modular parts that can connect to one another (Built-in docking elements? Turn them on and off...hurm) So say instead of building parts in the VAB, you lift whole sections of prefab, or build them in orbit using EPL (Bigger bits then you can lift...multiple scales?)

A thought man...I don't know where it came from but for some reason I want to take my ship past a window of a station and see Kerbals looking out.

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They don't look like they should really hold Kerbals, but you should consider giving them Connected Living Space support so that mods like Crew Manifest will know they can allow Kerbals to pass to/from habitats connected by your parts.

Also your UV map on the thing that looks like two hubs joined by a tube needs tightening up to remove that seam.

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I know this may be an odd thing to say, but have you considered modeling wedgelike or more futuristic structures for station parts? We have oodles and oodles of trusses, connectors, bits, and bobs. What I am thinking are more...inline with OKS functionality, but on the scale of a full on space station. Modular parts that can connect to one another (Built-in docking elements? Turn them on and off...hurm) So say instead of building parts in the VAB, you lift whole sections of prefab, or build them in orbit using EPL (Bigger bits then you can lift...multiple scales?)

A thought man...I don't know where it came from but for some reason I want to take my ship past a window of a station and see Kerbals looking out.

Hehehe. Actually, those aren't technically station components, but I made them with the possibility of using them as such. They are actually ship components. You'll understand more as I release more parts and example ship renders.

I also have some plans for a modular station core that is rather unlike anything I've seen on KSP. More on that later :)

This... I wish to play with it.

Give me a week or two, and I'll let you play test it :D

They don't look like they should really hold Kerbals, but you should consider giving them Connected Living Space support so that mods like Crew Manifest will know they can allow Kerbals to pass to/from habitats connected by your parts.

Also your UV map on the thing that looks like two hubs joined by a tube needs tightening up to remove that seam.

They aren't meant to hold kerbals. They are primarily crew passages. But yes, I am planning on adding support for Connected Living Space. AND, I'm glad you popped over. I am planning on adding support for your Reflective plugin to this mod and I'm wonder if you have to have suggestions for the textures as far as to where and how much reflection to add. I have my idea of what I'm going to do, but extra suggestions are always welcomed :)

As far as the UVs on those hubs, I'm actually going to completely redo the textures on those. I'm rather unhappy with their total appearance. So I will redo the texture to be a closer match to the textures on the components above.

Edited by noonespecial
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I know this may be an odd thing to say, but have you considered modeling wedgelike or more futuristic structures for station parts? We have oodles and oodles of trusses, connectors, bits, and bobs. What I am thinking are more...inline with OKS functionality, but on the scale of a full on space station. Modular parts that can connect to one another (Built-in docking elements? Turn them on and off...hurm) So say instead of building parts in the VAB, you lift whole sections of prefab, or build them in orbit using EPL (Bigger bits then you can lift...multiple scales?)

A thought man...I don't know where it came from but for some reason I want to take my ship past a window of a station and see Kerbals looking out.

As mentioned earlier, I have an interesting concept for the core space station. It's based off a concept idea I found called "The Gallagher Space Center".

There will be a super structure (trusses + reactor) at the core, then modular components that fit around the super structure to fill out the station. I haven't started modeling the parts yet, but I threw together these models on my break and work to illustrate the concept. Forgive the rough models and lack of details, this is just a "proof of concept" piece minus the aforementioned super structure.

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Feedback? Ask an ye shall receive.

Just make sure you balance them accordingly; I have yet to pick up most truss type add-ons as they don't provide fuel tanks that have a lower dry mass than rocket stacks. My suggestion is to make your truss tanks unique; high drag rating, fragile, but very light weight dry value. I personally use Real Fuels, and the math for the 'balloon' and 'CryoBalloon' seems most appropriate for dry mass. The trusses themselves should be durable, but still have high drag, and less mass than most structural elements like fuselage and adapters, as they don't have any covering.

I'd also suggest trusses with nodes on the outside, and trusses with nodes/attachment on the inside. Mostly the latter.

Finally, you might consider using the same technique B9 did in their recent release to combine models of similar shape together; for example, you have variants on the stock 6-node hub; you could combine all of them into a single part, and each variant has a different mesh & node config, but the overall shape is the same. Part bloat is always a consideration when I add any mod, and I know it is for others as well.

None the less, the reactor and trusses look like a neat idea. Will follow this if/when it's on Kerbalstuff ;) (nothing against curse, I just like Kerbalstuff's follow/notify better.)

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Feedback? Ask an ye shall receive.

Just make sure you balance them accordingly; I have yet to pick up most truss type add-ons as they don't provide fuel tanks that have a lower dry mass than rocket stacks. My suggestion is to make your truss tanks unique; high drag rating, fragile, but very light weight dry value. I personally use Real Fuels, and the math for the 'balloon' and 'CryoBalloon' seems most appropriate for dry mass. The trusses themselves should be durable, but still have high drag, and less mass than most structural elements like fuselage and adapters, as they don't have any covering.

I'd also suggest trusses with nodes on the outside, and trusses with nodes/attachment on the inside. Mostly the latter.

Finally, you might consider using the same technique B9 did in their recent release to combine models of similar shape together; for example, you have variants on the stock 6-node hub; you could combine all of them into a single part, and each variant has a different mesh & node config, but the overall shape is the same. Part bloat is always a consideration when I add any mod, and I know it is for others as well.

None the less, the reactor and trusses look like a neat idea. Will follow this if/when it's on Kerbalstuff ;) (nothing against curse, I just like Kerbalstuff's follow/notify better.)

Good advice all. Especially the drag. These systems are not atmospheric capable in the least and the drag should reflect that :D

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Glad I could help xD

I just remembered that FAR doesnt use the drag coefficient provided. If you want the parts to produce drag when using FAR, see the section on "Other Drag" found under the description here.

Also, how do you plan to handle how KSP only allows for 1-way hierarchy of parts for that cool modular system? Just curious.

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Glad I could help xD

I just remembered that FAR doesnt use the drag coefficient provided. If you want the parts to produce drag when using FAR, see the section on "Other Drag" found under the description here.

Also, how do you plan to handle how KSP only allows for 1-way hierarchy of parts for that cool modular system? Just curious.

I alluded to it earlier. There will be a station core (not shown in the renders because I haven't built it yet) that resides at the center of the sphere. The modular components will dock with the central core. The three "docking ports" on the sides of the model are more visual than functional. The functional docking port will be located on the bottom of each piece.

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So are you finished with the textures?

For the moment. Although I still have about 5 or 6 core parts to model. Inspiration my strike while making these models. I might spend some more time tweaking it after I watch a few more tutorials and feel more comfortable making the changes I want to make. I also have a few alternate textures I'm toying around with, including a dirty worn industrial texture.

KjsDepn.png

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I am planning on adding support for your Reflective plugin to this mod and I'm wonder if you have to have suggestions for the textures as far as to where and how much reflection to add. I have my idea of what I'm going to do, but extra suggestions are always welcomed :)

I don't have any opinion as to location but as to how much, if you're just going for glossy mildly reflective then you want small amounts. The more reflection the less significance any texturing has. Foil insulation should have pretty high quantities but I don't see anywhere on there that foil would be appropriate.

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Update Sept 21 2014

I'm putting the finishing touches on most of the parts for release. All of the initial components have been model and textured and configured in Unity. Currently, I'm setting up the part config files, which are utilizing a lot of part welds. This is a bit of an experiment for me and we'll see how it works out. As most of these parts share a common component (the central crew passage) instead of having that same model and texture populated across nearly a dozen parts, I'm part welding a that single part/texture with additional models to complete the set.

For example, in this series of parts:

pkxKRvx.png?1

There is actually four models (three of which share the passage of the first) and all share a single texture.

I'm not sure if this is a good practice, but we'll see how it works out. If it doesn't work very well, I can always just release them all as single components with unique textures instead of part welding all over the place :)

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Update Sept 21 2014 #2

Nearly ready for an Alpha Preview release. But noticed a few problems with three of the models. The command pod is grotesquely too large. Looks fine in Unity and on paper, but when building something, it's a giant eye sore. Need to scale it down. Plus, two of my other parts are.... strangely laggy in the VAB and have slow load times. Not sure what the problem is, polycount isn't "that" high and both are using custom colliders. In fact, the command pod has more polyies and it doesn't lag. So something isn't kosher about those two parts. Also, while assemblying a few test ships/stations, I immediately recognized the need for two other parts. I was hoping to release the preview release tonight or tomorrow, but looks like it just got pushed back until the weekend.

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