Solar panels seem overpowered

[Marclev]

The solar panels seem seriously over powered, I can power pretty much anything I need with a few of the basic flat panels in the stock game, the only thing I can think of that needs the basic folding panels is the ion drive. I can't even think of any use case that would require the giant panels, beyond role playing. The thermo-electric generator is as a result also rather pointless.

It'd be good to balance all of these, both in terms of reducing the power and increasing the cost, I'd like to have to be making conscious decisions regarding how much energy I need and how much I can afford to add.

[NathanKell]

Can't speak about balance, but stock solar panels are about 10-20x more powerful than real life ones, although they also mass considerably more than real life. It's only made worse by the power curves not following an inverse-square curve, however.

[chaos_forge]

I think the power-weight ratio is fine, but the power curves definitely need to be fixed.

[Boomerang]

I went about the power curve problem the laborious way and edited the panel modules for all my panel parts. Not so that they're equivalent to real life, but so that at least beyond Duna they're highly inefficient and that beyond Jool they're essentially useless, just to add another dimension to my game play.

I'm no hand at writing MM patches, but I can't imagine it would be too difficult to plot out a new power curve that conforms more to what we have to work with in real life and apply that at least to the stock panels.

[Murph]

The current panels are actually just about right for now. The giant panels are needed for the labs, as the combination of processing and transmitting experiments has a huge power usage. I don't see anything other than unnecessary frustration being gained by heavily nerfing them. That said, all electrical stuff should get a balancing pass before 1.0, I just don't see them as being overpowered right now, or in urgent need of attention. Best to leave that balancing until fairly late in beta, in my opinion.

The RTG does have a useful niche right now, in providing baseline power during solar blackout conditions.

[Joonatan1998]

I think they would be balanced if the smallest one wasn't massless.

[bv1]

I agree, Marclev. I've always been able to get by with a single battery pack and a single flat panel, except for Rovers and the Ion Drive. What Squad needs to do is make more parts constantly drain electric charge, such as manned capsules.

By the way, while we're on the topic of electrical systems changes... what about fuel cells?

[Kaos]

I think, the bigger solar panals would gain a lot more sense, when they would produce electricity, while the spacecraft is not focused and there was some science experiment, that needs a lot of power over a long time, also in not focused mode. Furthermore, then the production rate could be decreased, as it would allow for spacecraft with few solar power and big batteries, that are full powered, if you wait long enough, without having them active.

But I do not think, this would be implemented soon, because other things need to be fixed more urgent. Hence I have not suggested this, yet.

[CaptRobau]

I went about the power curve problem the laborious way and edited the panel modules for all my panel parts. Not so that they're equivalent to real life, but so that at least beyond Duna they're highly inefficient and that beyond Jool they're essentially useless, just to add another dimension to my game play.

I'm no hand at writing MM patches, but I can't imagine it would be too difficult to plot out a new power curve that conforms more to what we have to work with in real life and apply that at least to the stock panels.

The Stock Rebalance mod adds a MM patch made by me that makes the power curve follow the inverse square law as closely as is possible. It comes out to about the same efficiencies as your personal mod.

[Boomerang]

The Stock Rebalance mod adds a MM patch made by me that makes the power curve follow the inverse square law as closely as is possible. It comes out to about the same efficiencies as your personal mod.

Thanks, I'll take a look at that

[prophet_01]

Has anyone used tac ls and remote tech without further mods for energy generating parts? I am ok with the amount of electricity generated compared to weight. I agree that a larger number of parts should require electricity as I see how much playing with those 2 mods changed the importance of power consumption for me.

The distance issue is something I would like to see fixed aswell. But I also think we need an additional part if that happens. Something for the last nodes in the science tree. I am thinking about fuel cells or maybe a small fission reactor. Opinions?

[Laie]

The solar panels seem seriously over powered, I can power pretty much anything I need with a few of the basic flat panels in the stock game,

I think it's more a problem of there being not enough consumption. The only power-hungry devices are the lab, reaction wheels, and ion drives. Of these, the first two are very bursty: a lot of draw in a short time, then long phases of inactivity. You don't need very many panels if you only have enough batteries for a buffer.

Leaves the ion drive. It makes perfect sense, gameplay-wise, that it shouldn't be bogged down by the panels it needs.

[Iron4venger]

RTGs need generator decay half life. I'd really like to plan missions in advance to take full advantage of my available resources

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/96030-WIP-Plugin-Realistic-RTGs

Edited November 3, 2014 by Iron4venger

[ringerc]

I started off adding "realistic" panel sets to my vessels and soon realised it was ridiculous. I only needed three of the smallest flat photovolataics so one was facing the sun most of the time and the vessel would run fine with only its integrated battery. If I did lots of dark-side manouvering I'd add a battery, but even the teeny panels still recharge it fine.

Part of the issue is that there's no real reason to use antennae and other power-consuming units, so there's not much for the panels to supply unless you're using an ion drive or lots of gigantic reaction wheels.

[NERVAfan]

I think it's more a problem of there being not enough consumption. The only power-hungry devices are the lab, reaction wheels, and ion drives. Of these, the first two are very bursty: a lot of draw in a short time, then long phases of inactivity. You don't need very many panels if you only have enough batteries for a buffer.

Leaves the ion drive. It makes perfect sense, gameplay-wise, that it shouldn't be bogged down by the panels it needs.

Well, there's also rover wheels (but those aren't on spaceships) and transmitting antennae.

EDIT: I agree more power consumption would be nice.