KSP 0.90 'Beta Than Ever' Grand Discussion Thread!

[lajoswinkler]

I did Career (3rd time ever) on hard, too. You make one mistake and you can give up. That's what I did.

Overall, I like the update.

[Duxwing]

I'm playing Custom difficulty (Hard with Quicksave and Revert) and loving it! The skills are very useful and challenges exciting, and the experience point system keeps the pace reasonable.

Problems

-The paint on the first VAB's floor disappears when viewed from directly above.

-Between scenes sometimes appear such disturbing images as a huge, standing, orange-suited Kerbal from neck to knees.

-Vague "reasonable" tolerance for orbital missions' parameters.

Recommendations

-Stronger class definition; e.g., only Scientists can remove data and take surface samples, random part failure rate reduced or eliminated by engineers' presence.

-Environmental contamination fines for crashing parts into bodies; except Kerbol.

-Life insurance payout to dead Kerbals' families; payout proportional to experience.

-Duxwing

[WanderingKid]

Recommendations

-Environmental contamination fines for crashing parts into bodies; except Kerbol.

How do you propose to deal with this when everything self-destructs after 2.5 km from your active craft in atmo? It's a nice idea, but right now it's not a fair request for those on tight budgets.

[Starhawk]

Wow! I finally upgraded my R&D to tier 3! I had just enough before my last mission, but would have left me with a pittance for future launches. So I did a Mun mission to fulfill five contracts - one to take four temp measurements in flight, one to return science from space near the Mun, one to plant a flag on the Mun, one to deliver an outpost capable of containing five Kerbals, and finally, one more to take temperature measurements - four in flight and one on the surface. Tough challenge! The tolerance for position of the temperature measurement on the surface is much smaller than the in-flight measurements. I'm down to 623000 currency, but I can keep doing science.

Sondrin Kerman is now indefinitely stationed at Mun Outpost 1, but there are enough batteries to keep the lights on all night.

[Vanamonde]

Dumb question. The update I just had come through on Steam... Was the beta? If not how can I get it? I think I might need a code?

That was the beta. No code needed.

[Esme]

I know this is not a "how to" thread but I can't resist. You can mitigate this a bit by watching for your shadow. Make sure you're not coming down on the dark side or right at local noon. I use Kerbal Engineer and I ignore the height readings because shadows are more intuitive. This sounds like you're in "orbit" mode instead of "surface" mode. It's a very common problem. The game *usually* switches automatically but sometimes it doesn't. Weird. I thought they fixed this because I can't seem to find an angle at which to approach the ladder and cause them to fly away.

5th Horseman - Thank you, but I was quite deliberately testing 0.90 unmodded - otherwise how can I be sure that any issues I encounter aren;t caused by mods? I normally play with quite a few mods, but not whilst testing the basic game. I also have several hundred hours of play time* under my belt, and I know well about looking for ones shadow, and I was in surface mode - I always switch to that mode once my horizontal velocity is reasonably small compared to my vertical velocity. I repeat - the game NEEDS an altitude over surface indication of some sort, and a clear indication of whether ones vertical speed is negative or positive whether it be an on-board altimiter or an option to have Gene Kerman give you the readouts in a pop-up window if you request it. IMHO. *seriously. I know some of you can scarcely credit that anyone with THAT much experience can still find landing on the Mun a trial, but it is indeed so. Mind you, I did spend rather a lot of time happily puttering around Minmus by land in one game a couple of versions back (had a full-blown base and several outposts set up :-) ). Anyway, call me a slow learner if you will,but I've only once reached Duna and Eve (both with probes) and recently a not very close fly-by of Jool recently. Minmus I have covered. I can do orbital rendevous passably well, now. Tackling the Mun feels like taking an X-wing against the Death Star to me. Well, not quite that bad, but I really do not like attempting manned landings there unless I know the site I'm aiming for is more or less flat - because I've already landed a probe there. Darn it the editor isn;t spacing this properly - apologies if it reverts to a single block of text yet again! Edited December 21, 2014 by Esme

[Darknighthb]

I have a strange error on 64x. If I start a career game I don't get level 1 facilities, I get level 3. If I start a career in 32x I get lvl 1 but if I load that in 64x I get lvl 3 again. I know 64x is buggy but I have tried this several times on fresh install and it happens everytime. Anyone else noticed this?

[AlexinTokyo]

Known bug and reported elsewhere.

Windows x64 version is not stable, and really not recommended. Unless you're really breaking the (memory) bank with mods, you're much better off with the x86 (32-bit) version.

[cantab]

Recommendations

-Stronger class definition; e.g., only Scientists can remove data and take surface samples, random part failure rate reduced or eliminated by engineers' presence.

I don't think this is a good idea. Having pilots unable to do basic stuff with science would get annoying, and random failures are not a game mechanic the stock game wants.

-Environmental contamination fines for crashing parts into bodies; except Kerbol.

This, on the other hand, I like. Though I'd make it a minor reputation hit, rather than funds. Nothing much, certainly nothing that would undo the reputation boost from a successful mission, but something to think about especially.

It wouldn't be hard for the game to do. The game will know which body or which atmosphere a vessel has hit. It's even perfectly feasible to predict to a fair accuracy where it will hit, so the game could penalise you for dropping your boosters over land on Kerbin.

[moogoob]

Little detail I love from 0.90.0: The level 2 Astronaut complex has a computer playing KSP on a desk. Just made me laugh for some reason.

[The Yellow Dart]

I repeat - the game NEEDS an altitude over surface indication of some sort

I could agree with that if it were an unlockable part or feature of a building upgrade. Similar to unlocking probe cores with SAS, you should have to try landing a few times without knowing your altitude before unlocking a radar altimeter. It could even be paired with a mapping science experiment part.

[mordin86]

Thanks for the update guys, it works great!

[Masetto]

Game feels more polished with this patch.

The editor just got a WHOLE lot better. The editor additions are amazing, and really make aircraft building a 10x more enjoyable experience.

Best patch since I've bought the game. TY Squad.

Edited December 21, 2014 by Masetto

[Duxwing]

@Wandering Kid

The fine would vary with the cost of the part, encouraging recovery without crushing small budgets.

@I thought I implied that pilots could do such basic science as crew and EVA reports. The failures would not be 'random' in the sense that players could not entirely prevent them: failures could occur only on such complex craft as could bring an engineer.

@All I proposed the class restrictions because I believe they would encourage multi-Kerbal craft by necessitating all three classes for large, scientific missions to distant places. Safety-minded players would bring duplicate or even triplicate Kerbals, increasing payloads and thereby challenge.

-Duxwing

[cantab]

the game NEEDS an altitude over surface indication of some sort, and a clear indication of whether ones vertical speed is negative or positive whether it be an on-board altimiter or an option to have Gene Kerman give you the readouts in a pop-up window if you request it. IMHO.

Surface or "radar" altitude is available in the IVA view of most manned command pods. Though considering we have several IVA-less pods it warrants making available all the time.

Vertical speed is clearly given next to the altimeter.

[BrotatoSalad]

Get #hyped

Edited December 21, 2014 by BrotatoSalad
I wanted caps

[Queeblo]

Wow, SQUAD did this thing the way I wished for it to be done.

I just tried out the .9 release and it really blew my mind. The lack of gameplay I used to replace by addons, is now here. The Vanilla playthrough is pretty much all I could want and more. Not too overpowered, not too constraining.

Now I'm playing with KSPI, FAR, and some other performance improving mods (haven't upgraded my computer for 6 years is showing now), but it truly feels like a propper game expirience.

Can't wait for the full release, and best of wishes to the whole team.

/also, the modders. that's some marvelous work they're doing.

[Esme]

Surface or "radar" altitude is available in the IVA view of most manned command pods. Though considering we have several IVA-less pods it warrants making available all the time.

Vertical speed is clearly given next to the altimeter.

The problem with that is twofold - first, the time it takes to go between external and internal views, read the thing, and get back outside again. Second - the IVA one isn't very readable. (actually there's a third - no IVA if what you;re trying to land is a probe). I would love to have a full set of IVA readouts and instruments so that one could attempt to fly entire missions from IVA - but I would also like, whilst working on (slowly) improving my piloting skills, some means of accessing altitude over terrain data whilst not in IVA.

[Gary_P]

I think it makes sense to change things for the better, but it truly sucks to try and play a game that you never know when you're going to lose it all and have to completely start over.

Is it only me that is frustrated with this game?

Edit: It's not the game but the updates. Turn off steam updates and backup your saves before updating. This will sometimes save headaches. If you have a mod that isn't compatible, the saved ships in orbit are lost before you have a chance to say no.

This way in a day or so when there's an update to the mod, you can apply it and your ships should be ok unless there's a change like .9.

Edited December 22, 2014 by Gary_P

[cantab]

Probably not, it's a hard game. But you'll have to elaborate on why you're having to start over.

[RCgothic]

We were in alpha. We are now in beta. Unfortunately incompatibility occasionally comes with the territory.

[Gary_P]

I set up a backup to cover myself.

This way I'll have a chance of not losing everything each time that there is a update.

Sorry for the frustration, but I forget that this is not a finished product.

This last update was really a nice change too.

Sorry if my post sounded cranky. Today was my root canal day. Now that it's over I feel better.

Edited December 22, 2014 by Gary_P

[MajorThomas]

Wonderful update. Definitely Beta than ever. I've fallen in love with KSP all over again!!! THANKS SQUAD!!!

[GTC]

I could agree with that if it were an unlockable part or feature of a building upgrade. Similar to unlocking probe cores with SAS, you should have to try landing a few times without knowing your altitude before unlocking a radar altimeter. It could even be paired with a mapping science experiment part.

This works in .90. http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/37128-0-20-Bucky-s-Instruments-v0-0-4-RAD-ALT-and-VSI-update

[fahmiy123]

Anything above 200 part count is going to start eating in to your FPS, badly. This is a long-running flaw with the game. You have several options: 1.) Build a smaller ship with less parts, 2.) Invest in a haswell-core CPU (Intel, search into it) which seem to be the best for KSP, or get a slightly faster computer in general. My machines don't drop below 60 FPS launching unless I get in the 400+ part count region.

Here is my rig