Runway selfdestructs when launch heavy plane

[Shtirliz72]

Please see my post #18 on page 2 of this thread...

The public bug number is #3351. Feel free to add more information to this bug (and/or vote the bug up if you think it needs to be fixed).

Ok. I will add some info. But before that I will test this bug more carefully.

P.S. Do you saw anywhere on bugtracker other bug, with symmetrical parts moving/deleting-returning?

Edited October 28, 2014 by Shtirliz72

[Alshain]

[1] Actually, a lot of the glitches in .25 make me wonder what the Experimentals team were doing for the few weeks they had the game. Did no-one try to launch a huge rocket? Why didn't anyone notice how OP'd Outsourced R&D is? Etc.

I know exactly what they were doing. They were busy performing bombing runs on the VAB. I can state with an almost certainty nothing actually useful to the game got tested because people tend to be distracted by flashy flashy.

Anyway, right now the only real option if you don't want to limit your build options is to simply disable destructible buildings, they don't add anything to the gameplay so it's completely unnecessary.

Edited October 28, 2014 by Alshain

[Wanderfound]

I know exactly what they were doing. They were busy performing bombing runs on the VAB. I can state with an almost certainty nothing actually useful to the game got tested because people tend to be distracted by flashy flashy.

Anyway, right now the only real option if you don't want to limit your build options is to simply disable destructible buildings, they don't add anything to the gameplay so it's completely unnecessary.

It does add something for some of us. Early in my new .25 career game, I had a launch go badly amiss immediately post takeoff. Just as I was about to hit the abort button to get Jeb to safety, I realised that the very large rocket was now headed straight for the VAB.

So, instead of bailing out, Jeb stayed at the controls, fighting to keep the nose up long enough to allow the rocket to crash safely into the southern paddock, before finally ejecting the capsule and popping the chutes about two hundred metres off the deck. It was a near thing, but he made it; very dramatic, very fun.

But, obviously, tastes differ. Yay for the difficulty settings and debug menu.

[Claw]

[1] Actually, a lot of the glitches in .25 make me wonder what the Experimentals team were doing for the few weeks they had the game. Did no-one try to launch a huge rocket? Why didn't anyone notice how OP'd Outsourced R&D is? Etc.

Yes, and yes. There is an assumption in this post that the runway works the same now as it did before it showed up in experimentals, which is not the case. And strategies all around received a lot of tweaking.

I know exactly what they were doing. They were busy performing bombing runs on the VAB. I can state with an almost certainty nothing actually useful to the game got tested because people tend to be distracted by flashy flashy.

Maybe something to also keep in mind...This game is early release, which means that everyone involved can help out in finding bugs, even if you aren't on experimentals. It's a toss up between pre-testing taking forever, and releasing something people can play.

Some people get very fired up when they encounter a bug. If the same zeal were brought forward in creating bug reports through solid testing of the bug and a good report, it makes it easier to replicate and bring to the developers. When people find a bug that causes a problem, I can promise you that a strong bug report goes very far toward helping the problem. If people simply rely on the handfull of volunteer support on the forum to sift through every problem, it's going to take a while.

Cheers,

-Claw

[Alshain]

Maybe something to also keep in mind...This game is early release, which means that everyone involved can help out in finding bugs, even if you aren't on experimentals. It's a toss up between pre-testing taking forever, and releasing something people can play.

Some people get very fired up when they encounter a bug. If the same zeal were brought forward in creating bug reports through solid testing of the bug and a good report, it makes it easier to replicate and bring to the developers. When people find a bug that causes a problem, I can promise you that a strong bug report goes very far toward helping the problem. If people simply rely on the handful of volunteer support on the forum to sift through every problem, it's going to take a while.

Cheers,

-Claw

I'm aware that it's early access but this is a rather simple thing to find, maybe not the runway, but the launchpad for sure, and if you found the launch pad you would suspect the runway. There are the difficult to find issues and then there are the type of issues that should never have made it to any kind of release early access or otherwise. This is one of the latter. I'm also aware I tend to be a little pick because I work in the field, but I don't think I am here. What's worse? They haven't tried to fix it. They did less in past releases, that's why we had a 0.24.1 and a 0.24.2.

Edited October 28, 2014 by Alshain

[Dunbaratu]

It does add something for some of us. Early in my new .25 career game, I had a launch go badly amiss immediately post takeoff. Just as I was about to hit the abort button to get Jeb to safety, I realised that the very large rocket was now headed straight for the VAB.

So, instead of bailing out, Jeb stayed at the controls, fighting to keep the nose up long enough to allow the rocket to crash safely into the southern paddock, before finally ejecting the capsule and popping the chutes about two hundred metres off the deck. It was a near thing, but he made it; very dramatic, very fun.

Which is exactly why leaving "destructable buildings" turned off isn't a workaround. The danger of broken runways caused by what you did wrong is a fun challenge. The danger of broken runways caused by what the developers did wrong is NOT. What does work is turning it off very temporarily, just long enough to spawn the plane, then turning it back on once the plane is resting on its wheels ready to takeoff.

[Wanderfound]

Which is exactly why leaving "destructable buildings" turned off isn't a workaround. The danger of broken runways caused by what you did wrong is a fun challenge. The danger of broken runways caused by what the developers did wrong is NOT. What does work is turning it off very temporarily, just long enough to spawn the plane, then turning it back on once the plane is resting on its wheels ready to takeoff.

Yup. Which is pretty much what I expect them to have done by the time .90 drops.

In the meantime though, as mentioned at the start of the thread, you have a few workarounds to choose from (each of which has its own downside).

[Ruedii]

Don't forget, use more landing gear.

Many of my larger planes have at least 6 landing gear (3 pairs), if not 10 (5 pairs). This also makes landings much easier.

Unfortunately, more landing gear means more friction on the runway, but we all know how to work around that. (Moar engines!)

[O-Doc]

This is not a bug, it's broken gameplay mechanic that artificially limits the size of spaceplanes you can launch and land. It is guaranteed that no testing was done on this mechanic. If there was then, why no life support, deadly re-entry and other realism focused features in KSP? But wait, we should limit the size of your spaceplanes for... you know ...realism. I don't think so, devs were having a brainfart when they thought destructible runways and launchpads would be fun.

[sal_vager]

Big real world planes use a lot of wheels too, and for good reason, take a look at the galaxy.

And this thing is pretty heavy, 20 wheels helped

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[Dodgey]

This is not a bug, it's broken gameplay mechanic that artificially limits the size of spaceplanes you can launch and land. It is guaranteed that no testing was done on this mechanic. If there was then, why no life support, deadly re-entry and other realism focused features in KSP? But wait, we should limit the size of your spaceplanes for... you know ...realism. I don't think so, devs were having a brainfart when they thought destructible runways and launchpads would be fun.

Come now, we all know that it was only a precursor to what would come in 0.9.0, it's the foundation of upgradable buildings. I highly doubt that this was the intended effect of a half implemented feature. Just bite the bullet until the next release rolls and fixes it.

[sal_vager]

Of course testing was done, but you know, testers are smart enough to add sufficient wheels

And of course, Squad is treading the middle ground between realism and fun, guess someone needs to read more

[Hyomoto]

To be fair, no one has posted any pictures besides sal_vager. I'd like to see what some of the SSTO's that are causing this look like. I mean, I've CRASHED into the runway on a botched approach or had parts of the plane strike it on takeoff and I've yet to see it break. It clearly requires more effort than I'm putting in, are these B9 monstrosities which shouldn't conceivably be on the runway in the first place?

From the sounds of it, and the video posted about this, it seems like things landing vertically on it are causing the damage. If my plane can wipe out on a bad landing with no damage, it sort of supports the theory it may be a bug in how damage to the runway is calculated. After all, things don't usually land vertically on a runway.

[Claw]

To be fair, no one has posted any pictures besides sal_vager.

Hey! This is a fantastic idea! Maybe we could actually post what we are doing and what results in runway failure. Maybe provide some .craft files and/or pictures.

Maybe some of the ideas in a thread like this: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/92230-Stock-Support-Bug-Reporting-Guide

Cheers,

~Claw

[O-Doc]

Come now, we all know that it was only a precursor to what would come in 0.9.0, it's the foundation of upgradable buildings. I highly doubt that this was the intended effect of a half implemented feature. Just bite the bullet until the next release rolls and fixes it.

This is the thing I fear. Squad centering their gameplay around a broken mechanic. Almost all of my rockets blow up the launchpad and all of my medium to heavy lifter SSTOs blow up the runway. To be fair, I turned off destructible buildings after only a small amount of testing. It's hard to say whether Squad means to have this in the game or not but, if this persists then the whole section of gameplay based around broken runways and launchpads will be ignored by me. In terms of testing, I don't think QA wasn't aggressive enough to go back to Squad with a big WTF?!?

Sal, can we get that part of the screengrab that shows the beginning of the runway exploded? Hence the reason why you took off from the lawn.

Edit: Can we also see a screenshot after you've landed?

Edited October 30, 2014 by O-Doc

[Claw]

This is the thing I fear. Squad centering their gameplay around a broken mechanic.

Then help us do something about it. Basically all this thread is asking for up to this point is to have an indestructible runway and launchpad. Besides, each destructible building have an impact threshold. So if building is "upgradeable," it's likely that the impact threshold is upgradeable as part of that process.

Almost all of my rockets blow up the launchpad and all of my medium to heavy lifter SSTOs blow up the runway.

So as you said to sal, pictures please!

I'm able to run 5 SLS tanks with a handful of wheels down the runway without a problem. What qualifies as "medium" for you, and what does it look like?

In terms of testing, I don't think QA wasn't aggressive enough to go back to Squad with a big WTF?!?

As I said before, there's an assumption that the runway was unchanged during testing. This is untrue.

Sal, can we get that part of the screengrab that shows the beginning of the runway exploded? Hence the reason why you took off from the lawn.

Edit: Can we also see a screenshot after you've landed?

nudge, nudge,

I did blow up the launch pad with ~500 tons. Although using some launch clamps fixed that. So that sounds less like a bug and more like feedback to me. We might be haggling over where the maximum capacity should be set. But I'm still stabbing in the dark without further information for what other people are running into.

By the way, I looked at the model names for the launch pad, and it's listed as "Medium." I don't know if that delineation will stick around, but perhaps there will be a small, heavy and/or SLS variant.

Cheers,

~Claw

[Alshain]

I'm not asking for an indestructible runway or even haggling over the maximum capacity. What I want is for the game to not drop my plane on the runway like atomic bomb when the physics loads.

[Claw]

I've released a fix here called LargeCraftLaunchFix.dll: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/97285-0-25-Stock-Bug-Fix-Modules-%28Release-v0-1-4-2-Nov-14%29

It's not the most elegant, but seems to work. Let me know if you run into problems.

Cheers,

~Claw

[Dodgey]

@O-Doc

This is not what I'm understanding, what do you mean broken mechanic? Would you call a car broken if you took it off halfway through the production cycle and tried to drive it? What specifically do you mean by broken?

[Claw]

This is not what I'm understanding, what do you mean broken mechanic?

I think he means that he's worried there is some basic flaw in how destructible buildings are implimented, and he's worried that building upon this breakage might result in a mess.

And now that I've played with this bug more and built a initial fix, I agree that something isn't right. However, I don't think it's something inherently broken with launch pad and runway mechanics. Ships getting dropped at launch are experiencing up to 3G, which the pad/runway is interpreting as an impact. Essentially as Alshain was saying, the runway/pad is getting bombed at launch, though maybe not at the atomic level.

Cheers,

-Claw

Edited November 3, 2014 by Claw

[Dodgey]

Ok so it's about the implementation of the feature not the feature its self. I get it now.

[herbal space program]

I don't know if this is a separate bug, but I've recently had a very light ion glider I was working on self-destruct spontaneously on launch about half the time, apparently shaking itself apart right after the physics loads. If that doesn't happen initially, everything seems to work fine after that.

[Padishar]

That's probably caused by having too many physics insignificant parts. This can often cause random oscillations which build up and rip the craft apart...

[Capt. Hunt]

What I think they need to do is either beef up the runway/launchpad or give us per-building toggles for the destructibility.

[Alshain]

What I think they need to do is either beef up the runway/launchpad or give us per-building toggles for the destructibility.

Both of those just mask the real problem. You can land a large plane just fine, the runway is strong enough. The problem is the physics load and the subsequent dropping of the craft, they need to fix that. It's not an intended natural part of that game, it's just not been very important until now.