Stock Aero News from the Squadcast

[Motokid600]

Whaaaat? If Squad did not implement procedural fairings they will KILL che "fun" that they are saving without using FAR/NEAR. It's a nonsense guys.

They will kill the fun they are saving without FAR/NEAR.. whats that mean?

[Daze]

They will kill the fun they are saving without FAR/NEAR.. whats that mean?

That i think they are not implementing FAR because it will be too realisti/difficult for newbie who in KSP want to have fun and not realism. This kind of "fun" will be destroyed anyway with stantard size fairings, simply because the people who don't like FAR are for the 90% people who like to make GIANT payload, which obviously can't fit in a standard fairings.

(sorry but i don't speak english very well, hope it's more clear now )

[Alshain]

They will kill the fun they are saving without FAR/NEAR.. whats that mean?

I was thinking the same thing.

They don't have to implement procedural fairings to implement fairings. It would be nice, but not required.

[Whirligig Girl]

If they took a truly realistic approach to aerodynamics, the delta-v to orbit would be reduced by so much that you can get payload fractions of over 50%. The souposphere needs to stay in stock. No matter what they do, they can't make aerodynamics worse than it already is. And Ferram Aerospace Research will still be a mod of course! They wouldn't make it impossible for FAR to work! (Though it would probably need updating by Ferram.)

[Bill Phil]

Procedural fairings can start to get ridiculous. And the point of aero is to limit that ridiculousness. So if they add procedural fairings why add a better aerodynamic model at all?

[Superfluous J]

I don't want to muddy the waters with a new post, but am not totally happy posting this on page 4 where nobody will see it. But here are my notes I took when I watched this.

I changed my mind. Sorry about that

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/107095-Summary-of-Squadcast-2015-01-12

Edited January 12, 2015 by 5thHorseman

[Whirligig Girl]

I have every intention of sticking with 0.90 unless something amazing happens. I'd still be on 0.24.2 if gizmos didn't exist.

Why? Ferram Aerospace Research will still be available, and the game will be updated in other respects as well. The game gets better with each update.

[worir4]

If they took a truly realistic approach to aerodynamics, the delta-v to orbit would be reduced by so much that you can get payload fractions of over 50%. The souposphere needs to stay in stock. No matter what they do, they can't make aerodynamics worse than it already is. And Ferram Aerospace Research will still be a mod of course! They wouldn't make it impossible for FAR to work! (Though it would probably need updating by Ferram.)

This is true. If they include something similar to FAR/NEAR i suppose a lot of part balancing would have to be done.

[Leszek]

Oh my.

The drama.

Seriously, we have known for some time now that they weren't putting FAR into the game. In addition, we don't know anything about the new aerodynamics coming up. Already people are crying. If they didn't put new aerodynamics people would be crying. If they put in FAR, people would be crying. If they put in Near, people would be crying.

We have some people talking about how they expect Squad to screw up the new system. Really. Lets just forget the whole damned game is made by Squad. They managed to not screw that up.

Lots of useless, pointless, drama about what exactly?

FAR and NEAR are good, but there is more than one way to skin the cat. The new aerodynamics might be totally awesome. They can't be worse than stock aero.

Farram4 might quit his mod. TRUE. (And that was always the case. What would you do if he quit regardless of a new version of KSP? It could have happened and can happen at any time.) Or his mod might not be functional and fixable to make it functional in the new version. Also TRUE. But even in that worse case scenario there new aerodynamics would still be better than stock and might actually be pretty good. There is literally no point in any drama now except for one talking point...

I would take this opportunity to urge Squad make sure FAR/NEAR is still possible and or fixable in just in case.

I would take this opportunity to urge everyone else to relax. This whole thread reminds me of Weird Al's song, "First World Problems."

[vexx32]

Leszek, this happens pretty much every time a major feature is announced. Everyone's afraid it won't be absolutely perfect, and there'll be so many things wrong with it, and it won't be exactly what they personally have been asking for.

Change is a difficult thing, even for those accustomed to it. There'll be people fretting all the way up to the next release, and there'll be complaints after it. Always are. At the end of the day, we just hope that the game continues to get better, regardless of how it changes.

So far, Squad have proven they can very much continue to do that.

[dryer_lint]

Since FAR is pretty much perfect, it can't possibly be better than FAR

ಠ_ಠ

10chars

[Renegrade]

If they took a truly realistic approach to aerodynamics, the delta-v to orbit would be reduced by so much that you can get payload fractions of over 50%. The souposphere needs to stay in stock. No matter what they do, they can't make aerodynamics worse than it already is. And Ferram Aerospace Research will still be a mod of course! They wouldn't make it impossible for FAR to work! (Though it would probably need updating by Ferram.)

I doubt it would be more than 30%. That's fine, they can just knock back the ISPs across the board, they're fake numbers anyways (and it's currently about 17-18% payload fraction, leaving aside exploits like using #loljetengines). Cantab had an interesting suggestion about an 85% nerf that would bring the spacy engines down to typical hydrazine/nto levels (314.5 for the 370s, 331.5 for the 390s, not too far off of ex. the apollo service engine's 314.0) - that would dial the payload back some. Actually, the Isp numbers are in make-believe kerbin units anyways, they could just redefine standard gravity to be say, 0.01, and you'd have less payload fraction than an Earth rocket. When launching from Minmus. With a massless ion drive.

(If you have numbers to suggest it's higher than 30%, I'd gladly check them out. I'm currently reworking my toolchain, so I can't whip up examples. Well I could, but 'whip up' sort of implies in an instant fashion, and I don't want to use calc.exe~)

I would take this opportunity to urge Squad make sure FAR/NEAR is still possible and or fixable in just in case.

Yes please.

I would take this opportunity to urge everyone else to relax. This whole thread reminds me of Weird Al's song, "First World Problems."

I think you're reading drama where none exists. At least for me, anyways. Then again, for whatever reason I come across as meaner/harsher than I actually intend to be. Probably been working in big, Dilbertean corporations too long.

[Motokid600]

That i think they are not implementing FAR because it will be too realisti/difficult for newbie who in KSP want to have fun and not realism. This kind of "fun" will be destroyed anyway with stantard size fairings, simply because the people who don't like FAR are for the 90% people who like to make GIANT payload, which obviously can't fit in a standard fairings.

(sorry but i don't speak english very well, hope it's more clear now )

No. FAR/NEAR would make it easier for a newbie. Less dV to orbit and common intuition works. Again its the unrealistic aspects of the present game that make the learning curve as steep as it is.

GIANT payloads you say? That's easier in FAR because of less dV to orbit. 1000t+ launchers are easier to make in FAR then they are in stock KSP. Your talking about the big, ridiculous pancake rockets people make, well... that too it also possible. Just gotta take it slow. But IMO.. good freakin riddance of those pancakes if such a system is implemented.

[klgraham1013]

Whaaaat? If Squad did not implement procedural fairings they will KILL che "fun" that they are saving without using FAR/NEAR. It's a nonsense guys.

You're overreacting. Managing payload size is not difficult.

[Starwhip]

If they took a truly realistic approach to aerodynamics, the delta-v to orbit would be reduced by so much that you can get payload fractions of over 50%. The souposphere needs to stay in stock. No matter what they do, they can't make aerodynamics worse than it already is. And Ferram Aerospace Research will still be a mod of course! They wouldn't make it impossible for FAR to work! (Though it would probably need updating by Ferram.)

One of my latest stock SSTO's has a 62% payload fraction.

[tater]

New players EXPECT aerodynamic designs to work, because they have not yet been taught that every single aircraft/rocket they have ever seen or heard of in real life is nonsense in stock KSP. I'm still kind of surprised that anyone has nay problem with FAR, I have honestly not even noticed it is installed.

[Scoundrel]

If I may present my worthless opinion on the subject*:

I think this thread is a bit premature as nobody who can post here has seen the design document detailing the proposed aerodynamic system, nor sat in any of the dev meetings where aerodynamics are discussed... and if they have, they certainly wouldn't be able to reveal any of the particulars for obvious reasons. IMHO, vaguely worded casual musings made by the devs regarding their intent towards improving a feature are hardly the equivalent of design document revelations worthy of declarations unplayability.

Therefore I respectfully submit that it would be prudent (and more constructive for the community) if we refrain from polarizing our positions based on pure speculation and reserve judgment for when the new aerodynamics are implemented.

Who knows, it might almost be as good as FAR.

* Yes, I do understand that this thread is mostly a place for those who were hoping FAR would be made stock could vent their disappointment, but I would like to address the conversation in general.

[CaptainKipard]

I hope they make it possible to launch a craft with the external seat, which should be ok for rovers, but should kill Kerbals when travelling too fast through the atmosphere.

[Daze]

You're overreacting. Managing payload size is not difficult.

I'm not talking for me, actually i try to be realistic when i build a rocket, so for me a standard fairings wouldn't be a problem. And like motokid said it's easier, yes i know but there's people who don't want to have FAR because "it's too difficult and kill the fun!1!1"

[prophet_01]

It would be sad if they aren't willing to do a big-ish step towards FAR imo. I agree it can't be much worse than that soup we have now... but that's not rly a good reason to stop halfway (learning courve might or might not be such a reason)

I don't think that the people here are overreacting all that much. They just care a lot about this particular aspect. Considering how long the aero overhaul has been delayed it's actually not the harsh discussion I expected to see. I think it's a good thing to find out what's the current opinion of the community. Isn't that the point of early access? I don't see much histeria and arguably the worst we have around here are opinions that sometimes lack a solid foundation.

[BudgetHedgehog]

Go FAR or don't go at all. Really am nervous about what Squad do, especially if it kills FAR.

[ratchet freak]

The biggest barrier for including FAR isn't public outcry but license issues; both FAR and NEAR are "Licensed under GNU GPL v3" which means that if Squad includes either then it will need to open source KSP in its entirety unless they can get a separate license from ferram and he can guarantee he owns all the code in it.

Otherwise if ferram suddenly gets greedy he can file a DMCA and block Squad from selling KSP

[ferram4]

I don't know why everyone's so disappointed about something not on the scale of FAR or NEAR; we should have seen this coming, given how long this has been delayed. An aerodynamics model on the level of either of those is, ultimately, an alpha feature, one that (for maximum efficiency and reduction in edge cases) should have been implemented many, many many updates ago. Long before NEAR actually existed, and probably before FAR was something significant. The very fact that this was put off until beta basically indicates that it's going to be less than what most had hoped for.

And there is a reason for this: they can't make that change anymore. Too many users are used to the stock model; even their improved, not-quite-what-it-should-be one will make them scream bloody murder. Part clipping took away quite a few of the methods that would allow for quick and easy determination of the entire vessel's aerodynamics, and frankly, they're still gonna end up running into problems allowing that. They have ultimately backed themselves into a corner by waiting so long on this.

As for implementing FAR or NEAR directly, that was never a viable option; they're both GPL and I'm not the only one who's contributed code. They're both locked away. Didn't stop me from offering to help them out with the aerodynamics, since I could have always coded something new for them, but given that they haven't contacted me over that, I gather that they're not interested. I hope they know what they're doing and that whatever comes out of it is just as easy to mod as the stock system we have now; FAR can't afford to use computationally expensive workarounds for locked-away stuff (not in real-time anyway), and if it comes to that, FAR will probably die with 0.90.

[Daze]

Well, till now and with the words of ferram this is the only update that doesn't sound good. Hope it will be nice :/

[Whirligig Girl]

...and if it comes to that, FAR will probably die with 0.90.

But it will almost certainly never come to that. Especially with everyone making such a fuss about it.

- - - Updated - - -

If they add re-entry heating, and ways for reusable craft and spaceplanes to circumvent that problem using heatshields, I'll be very happy.

Think about it! Re-entry damage is just shock heating, another form of Mach effects, so why wouldn't they take this chance! Incidentally, I always wondered why FAR never implemented re-entry heating.