What would you like in .26?

[CDK]

Tell me what you would like in KSP .26 in the comments below:

[CDK]

Thank you Vanamonde and KasperVld for re-opening this!

THANKS FOR RE-OPEN REQUEST

[biohazard15]

Bugfixing. Strictly bugfixing.

The radial decoupler bug and exploding launchpad\runway bug must go away. Like, now.

[TheGatesofLogic]

I would like a large number of completely unused tech nodes to be added to the game to help simplify modding tech trees. There are only like 12 unused nodes currently, and the current system people are using for adding additional nodes is hardly more than a hack and brings up numerous bugs and issues that must be dealt with by modders on an individual basis. It is extremely annoying. It would take all of probably 30 minutes to add maybe +30 unused tech nodes and would help the modding community greatly.

[CDK]

Agreed. More ideas than bugs? Such as, parts and stuff like that?

[briansun1]

Stable 64-bit.

[Tweeker]

Life support, More EVA activites such as strutting, better science

[Rdivine]

Commercial missions e.g. send a specific payload/ kerbal into the designated orbit and you get rep/funds.

Also, the start of multiplayer!

[kujuman]

I'm personally rooting for work on the Kerbals themselves, i.e. training astronauts etc. If we ever get the custom kerbals in game this would be a nice time to do it

Depending on timing we may get Unity 5 (no release date yet), and y'all know what that means (physx 3.3). We should get some performance increases and just better physical simulations. Might take a while to debug KSP to work with it, so I would not be surprised if .26.5 or .27 or .27.5 was just getting KSP into Unity 5.

[sumghai]

- Gendered (probe/drogue) docking ports

- Docking ports with limited orientations / rotational alignments

- Further refinements to 0.25's improved ModuleAnimateGeneric; specifically, the ability for add-on authors disable animation toggling on EVA and the flight scene (latter is useful for parts that are supposed to only be configured in the VAB/SPH)

- Moddable EVA / IVA spacesuits

- Unity PartTools fix for bloated scene file sizes when loading InternalSpaces / Props from GamaData.

- Upgrade to Unity 5 / PhysX 3.3

[kujuman]

- Gendered (probe/drogue) docking ports

- Docking ports with limited orientations / rotational alignments

I like the idea of these, and I would probably use them, but I'd want it to be a configurable option with the stock docking ports remaining androgynous. When the 2.5m docking ports came out there was enough problem with players putting them on backwards and thinking that the docking ports didn't work at all.

[Boomerang]

Sticking with somewhat realistic expectations (we're not getting life support functions in .26, etc), I'd really, really like to see finished IVAs for all the parts that need them. I realize that we're in a pre-release, but if they're going to take the time and care between versions to release them as cleanly as possible (rather than throwing out things as soon as they're finished, pre-testing), then the parts they're releasing really ought to be finished.

It's one thing for a part-pack to have unfinished IVAs that the author gets around to eventually, but it feels a bit sloppy for the stock game to be run that way. To my mind, anyway.

If they could suss out the bees regarding EVA'ing onto ladders, that'd be great too.

[SpacedCowboy]

Action groups with fuel tanks.

[PikachuNL]

Better landing gear... The current small gear bay (Hey, shouldn't be there a "big gear bay"?) looks like you've put a wheeled banana on your plane, unless you clip it, but that makes the ground clearance lower, which sucks. It should also be possible to put them diagonally to the ground (modern fighterjets) and that the wheels turn with it

Adjustable height would be cool, too

[manni01]

It would be cool if they put in an animation for picking up a surface sample. And also: bug fices like the glowing parts that crash your game.

[landerote]

1. Improved tracking station, making possible to group ships in the left side and with more types of vessels (if customizable, better).

2. Commercial contracts, asking you to launch a specific payload (some different satellites can be created as ships) to an specific orbit/inclination or destination.

3. Customizable Kerbals/Suits

4. Kerbals training, and that training and the experience to have impact in their availability, and mission success (could be also a system so that if they don't have enough experience they can not perform orbital flights, interplanetary flights etc).

5. Achievements of each kerbal, with their accomplished missions, records etc.

[Padishar]

I too would really like the main focus of 0.26 to be on fixing lots of the quite serious bugs that have built up. I would be happy with absolutely no new features at all if it meant that my ships wouldn't spontaneously destroy themselves in all sorts of situations for no good reason...

[FITorion]

This may be wishful thinking but...

ever since resources got canned... and the ability to build buildings with functionality of KSC buildings on other worlds that, that was to allow... I've been hoping some other way of doing that will be found and added to the game.

I think destructible buildings heralds just such a system... and that is precisely what I want. Buildings suitable for off world colonies... Habitation, Science labs, Power plant, Communications, and of course VAB, Spaceplane hanger, and Launchpads suitable to off world locations.

a fuel tank could easily have "parts" in it instead of fuel. Not saying modify a fuel tank but that the code for fuel tanks could easily be adapted. These parts and cash could be used to construct buildings at a location... say with a construction part... something that functions like a flag to mark the location for the building to appear in. This is just one way it could be done...

I heard something about Kerbal training as well... I'd like to see this give bonuses or status effects basically. Have a scientist kerbal and get more science out of an experiment... or maybe get more science out of a previously depleted area. Have a trained pilot and have more efficient use of fuel... they could even have different favored fuels... so one was better at docking maneuvers say and thus didn't use up Monoprop as fast. Stuff like that. The more variety the better.

[sirkut]

Bug fixing. That's all I want. I don't want any new features until bugs are sorted. Adding new features just compound the bugs.

[kujuman]

I too would really like the main focus of 0.26 to be on fixing lots of the quite serious bugs that have built up. I would be happy with absolutely no new features at all if it meant that my ships wouldn't spontaneously destroy themselves in all sorts of situations for no good reason...

As much as I agree for us players, from a development perspective I doubt they'd work on physics issues until Unity 5 comes out, as it will undoubtedly introduce new physics bugs and can make massive bug-fixing efforts in .26 worthless. Unity 5 may also solve bugs all on its own *crosses fingers*.

Although fixing invisible buildings would be fantastic.

[juanml82]

Better rover controls

Let the kerbals do something on IVA: throw snacks at their fellow astronauts, move around (within possibilities). That's probably not happening for 0.26, unless Squad is already working on it

Delta-V and TWR readouts

Better resource transfer

Show the AN/DN nodes regarding the body the craft is orbiting

Remove the ant engines

Add the proper fuel tanks for the experimental engine tests (say, you have to test the ion engine, add one of the xenon tanks. For the KR-L2, add on of the 3.5m tanks)

MK3 sized cargo bays

The option to start the career with only the essential buildings and be required to build the rest

IVAs for all crewed mod, including the MK2 crew cabin and the lab

Surface sample animations

[DBowman]

I think there is currently a discontinuity in the learning curve / difficulty between 'Munn shots' and 'interplanetary missions. I imagine some people would hit that 'wall' and start to loose interest. A new player can pretty easily bootstrap into Munn missions as soon as they figure out how to use the manoeuvre node and the idea of targeting a body - but those techniques don't 'scale up' well.

Some web resources/mods really help out with this (thanks and kudos to the interplanetary transfer authors), but that has the disadvantages:

- external to the game itself; any game needs to have a self contained core.

- makes the transfer windows seem 'magical'; you get a nice feeling that you understand/learnt something about orbital dynamics when playing around Kerbin-Munn/Min or Jool-LTVBP. You don't get the same feeling from protractor or alexmoon's delta-v plot.

I know you can 'throw a probe just out of Kerbin SOI' and then use manoeuvres of that for mission planing; but it's convoluted, inaccurate, and doesn't help much for the return trip.

One way to make interplanetary mission planning more natural would be to extend the tracking station map so you could add strings of manoeuvre nodes based off planet/moon/etc trajectories. The Kerbals clearly have the math/tech to do the manoeuvre node predictions etc, it's a bit mysterious why they only use it for the 'easy problems'.

I believe this has been suggested before, I don' think it's been ruled in or out. Maybe there is a better way to address what I see as an issue.

[Tw1]

One way to make interplanetary mission planning more natural would be to extend the tracking station map so you could add strings of manoeuvre nodes based off planet/moon/etc trajectories. The Kerbals clearly have the math/tech to do the manoeuvre node predictions etc, it's a bit mysterious why they only use it for the 'easy problems'.

I agree, mission planning of some sort makes sense to be included eventually.

I'm torn between wanting it in the Tracking Station, or in Mission Control.

The Tracking Station makes sense, as the solar system map is already loaded.

But as this is about planning your missions, it would be nice to have it in Mission Control. As well as the manoeuvre node planner, they could have other info- maybe a porkchop plot generator, based of alexmoon's one, and a little explanation how it works. If "We don't want to take the trial and error out by giving you a delta V counter" is still a thing, they could not give you a delta V value, and just have it show "most efficient", and "least efficient"

Or at very least, a one dimensional version that shows no arrival date.

It could have different features to the map view in Tracking station:

• The ability to time warp forwards and backwards, without changing the "real" world. A fast forward to date would be useful to.
  
• The ability to start a node from a point on the ground, or from any ship.
  
• Maybe a tally off all the manoeuvre nodes? Or list of all nodes, and their info, letting you select each?
  
• Perhaps allowing two strings of manoeuvre nodes at once, so you can plan arrivals of two ships, or use one as a target orbit for something that's not there yet.
  
• Manuver nodes that you planned here could be saved to the ship you planned them on, or transferred to a ship you've newly put on the Launchpad/Runway.
  
• As an alternative to the Porkchop plot thing proposed above, they could have something that shows the phase angle between the body you're near/ focused on, and your target. This could go from red to green as you reach the optimal angle.
  
  Though I prefer the other idea.
  

I think it should be harder, if not not possible to load a ship from this mission planning screen, to reduce the chance of accidents. Perhaps switching to ships could be done like in the space centre scene.

The main problems I see with not having it in the tracking station are-

• People could go to the tracking station by mistake. Or, they go there, then decide they want to test something first, and have to go back to the space centre, then to mission control. That's a lot more loading time than just switching a few features off.
  But maybe it's time they let us go straight from one building to another.
  
• If switching and finding asteroids can be done from there, it would make the Tracking Station redundant. The tracking station would need more tracking stuff features.
  

I think we're fine without it, but it would be useful, for bigger missions and planing gravity assists. Plus, more planning tools fleshes it out more, and would be good for immersion. Less use of outside tools, and all this planning would feel more like you're running a space program.

Also, since this is the what I'd like to see in 0.26 thread, I will repeat that we are overdue for female kerbals.

Having all the in game jobs held by men kerbals = not a good message for KSP.

Edited October 13, 2014 by Tw1

[Darnok]

Things I would love to see in 0.26:

1. More action groups, allow us to define different action groups sets for every remote or manned command part (first tab) we have in craft, during flight game would execute action from part that is set as current in command.

2. Make docking ports rotate to exact 90 deg, so we can always have pretty looking space stations.

3. Stock fairings and heat shields, I know aero fix is not going to happen soon, but how we can show KSP for friends, that are very new to space flights, without pretty rockets? Newbies have no idea about space planes, for them space exploration is all about rockets!

Things I would like to see in next few versions:

4. Planning flights like in post above and some kind of alarm clock for better control over multiple flights.

5. More parts... more tiny parts, right now we have only two fuel tanks in that size, would be great to have spherical tank like for mono propellant and tiny jet engine.

More parts between sizes 0.625m and 2.5m, because of cargo bays.

More manned capsules with different shapes and features, some may have RCS fuel some not, some may have build-in other features like solar panels on one side or chutes. Something like Boeing bigelow would be great.

6. Life support, I read great idea how to do this http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/96434-Morale-and-Efficiency-How-to-fix-OPness-of-one-man-craft-and-many-other-problems Of course in hard mode kerbals should die after some time

7. I have no idea what mechanic it would need, but it would be great to have control over few crafts at same time...

For example we can build Falcon 9 like 100% reusable rocket, but we can't reuse it because KSP won't let us to land with 1st stage and at same time reach orbit with 2nd stage+payload.

Same thing is with Virgin Galactic White knight two, if we want to land our payload won't reach orbit, if we make orbit White knight two is going to fall almost like rock and crash.

I know it is because of physics engine unload crafts that are farther than 2.5km.

[MattW93]

Mission Planners. It's always frustrating to get a craft into orbit and then not know whether it's in a good position to reach, say, Duna. Real missions are planned well in advance so they know exactly how hard to burn, where and when. Other things I would like to see include life support. Also cameras to put on unmanned vehicles so you can actually get a look at the planets over which you're flying using the IVA mechanic. Maybe they could include some kind of science gain, too.