Why isn't squad using procedural parts and tanks?

[TeeGee]

I don't understand this...

We have mods that literally chop the number of parts the game has to load using procedural parts (tanks and wings) yet squad wants to keep using parts that take up more RAM.

Why?

Furthermore... could it be feasible or possible to have procedural generated ENGINES? Let me explain:

First: Pick a barebones pump system that comes in 5 sizes (small-very large). Each size has different stats that affect engine performance.

Second: Pick a type of gimbal (if you want one) and modify its gimbal range at your discretion. More gimbal = heavier weight.

Third: Pick one of 4 sizes of engine bells that affect thrust and ISP.

Fourth: Pick what type of fuel it burns (Liquid fuel or monopropellant).

One model for each level but each has different sizes that you can scale in the VAB (think tweakscale).

Jet engines need to be trimmed down to one type of engine; just a turbofan (basic jet engine). Pick one of 5 sizes and attach it to a engine nacelle (needed) that can also be scaled.

No more turbojet.

RCS can be scaled the same way as engines causing changes in stats.

[klgraham1013]

I think they like the lego-like nature that KSP has.

[tater]

They could, presumably, add kinds of procedural parts that are not as adjustable, right? Like you can only change the diameters to stock values, and only change the lengths up to certain limits (as PP does, unlocked by the tech tree). Same with wings, have a few shapes, and allow simple scaling of them within some range.

[cpast]

Procedural parts lend themselves to designing by the numbers. Many people have lots of fun designing by the numbers; even though I don't use procedural parts, I'm generally one of them. But procedural parts confront someone with *mandatory* dealing with numbers, whereas fixed-size parts encourage playing around in a Lego-like manner. It's relatively simple to grasp tossing on another fuel tank, while procedural parts instead much more strongly encourage calculating the right value; it seems like Squad prefers having people snap together parts instead of having them calculate the correct value. Squad *normally* seems to prefer Lego-style; tweakables are numeric and would get you to modify an existing part instead of swapping it out or adding a new part, but other than that they seem to prefer swapping what parts you use over changing properties of the part.

What would be nice from a strictly memory usage point of view would be to reuse textures more, or even implement parts as procedural under the hood while having fixed sizes that snap together. For instance, it'd be neat to have normally fixed fuel tank sizes, which all reference the procedural tank but have fixed size. That way, they'd only have the one model and texture, but would still have the Lego effect. They could also then put a modifiable procedural tank at the very end of the tech tree; that way, they'd have the Lego style they seem to like, while not needing a ton of different parts.

[prophet_01]

I think it's to reduce the learning courve. It's very easy to get started if it's as easy as lego. But I agree, that certain types of parts would benefit from a procedural mechanic (I think of wings and fairings). But I understand the devs view on this. I think procedural parts aren't needed for most tasks and should remain an optional feature at the end of the tech tree. Imo RAM issues shouldn't be solved with procedural parts, they can however enhance the possibilties and ease the design of certain vessesls

[RainDreamer]

Unless automated, like procedural fairing, procedural parts require a lot of tuning, which is a pain for a casual player that just want to slap things together and shoot it to space.

[Tuareg]

I don't understand this...

We have mods that literally chop the number of parts the game has to load using procedural parts (tanks and wings) yet squad wants to keep using parts that take up more RAM.

Why?

Furthermore... could it be feasible or possible to have procedural generated ENGINES? Let me explain:

First: Pick a barebones pump system that comes in 5 sizes (small-very large). Each size has different stats that affect engine performance.

Second: Pick a type of gimbal (if you want one) and modify its gimbal range at your discretion. More gimbal = heavier weight.

Third: Pick one of 4 sizes of engine bells that affect thrust and ISP.

Fourth: Pick what type of fuel it burns (Liquid fuel or monopropellant).

One model for each level but each has different sizes that you can scale in the VAB (think tweakscale).

Jet engines need to be trimmed down to one type of engine; just a turbofan (basic jet engine). Pick one of 5 sizes and attach it to a engine nacelle (needed) that can also be scaled.

No more turbojet.

RCS can be scaled the same way as engines causing changes in stats.

i think the modders didnt give their work free and its beyond squads abilities to implement without breaking the code just use the mods

[Van Disaster]

Nothing to stop anyone implementing fixed size parts with procedural assets - that way nobody has to twiddle sliders and we can all reap the benefit of less assets including every mod given support for procedural items would be built right in the game. You can make texture mapping more sophisticated the current tanks/fairings, have a look at Bac9's wings in development for instance - so there's no need for everything to look the same either. I don't understand why they can't even use resource switching to save on part count.

[Nemrav]

Another thing to consider is... explosions...

I made a space plane that used solid boosters to get high up, but one of them collided with my wing.

But because it only broke a section of my wing off, I was able to use sas to keep wrenching my plane straight in order to get to a safe orbit, for the crew to be rescued.

If you had a procedural part, then it would have been "*booom*, now half your plane is destroyed, gl landing without an emergency escape system"...

[Alshain]

For me it depends on the part and the benefit. The primary goal should be to reduce the overall parts the game has to load without drastically altering the lego like gameplay. Rather than fully procedural parts, a TweakScale implementation for structural parts and fuel tanks would be preferred, but not for engines or command pods and cockpits. This would allow for you to have similar parts in every size range without overloading our computers and without being fully procedural.

Fairings are a different story for me, these are the only parts I prefer as procedural.

[Van Disaster]

Well the point is you can have entirely discrete *parts* that show up just like the current ones - but using procedural assets as a base *without the user having or being able to tweak them at all* - rather like making a range of different sized parts from one base using MM, only in a more sophisticated way. That way the overhead is mostly part definitions, not discrete textures and models for three dozen cylinders. And underlying it all is a procedural model engine you could harness for actual procedural stuff if you wanted.

[NathanKell]

That latter bit is more or less what modern, well-made part packs do (and what, say, Porkjet did for Squad): share assets between models. That's not procedural, that's just good practice.

As for why not? Because Harv et al don't like 'em. That simple. They've said it before and, if they ever mention them again, they'll say it again.

[rynak]

They insist on backwards compatibility for aero... what do you think is their take on axing half of the part catalog?

Not that i agree with this, just pointing out the obvious.

EDIT: As for making it more accessable... the pictures with the parts could have 2-3 small sub-buttons inside them, to pick a preset-size. This would reduce clutter, yet still allow to just pick a 2m or 5m tank, instead of messing with sliders.

Also, even for slider usage, this can be made more intuitive than the procedural mods do it. I.e., the moment you click on a tank, a small popup could appear. The steps also could be less finegrained, i.e. for tanks 1m steps... this way, you dont even need a slider, but could do it with arrow buttons.

Edited January 22, 2015 by rynak

[MartGonzo]

For me it depends on the part and the benefit. The primary goal should be to reduce the overall parts the game has to load without drastically altering the lego like gameplay. Rather than fully procedural parts, a TweakScale implementation for structural parts and fuel tanks would be preferred, but not for engines or command pods and cockpits. This would allow for you to have similar parts in every size range without overloading our computers and without being fully procedural.

Fairings are a different story for me, these are the only parts I prefer as procedural.

This ^

I've been hoping for tweakscale integration since I first came across the mod, it increases the variation of parts available without significantly adding to memory requirements.

although I don't see any reason not to include cockpit's, engines etc. it makes sense to me to maximise the variability of parts available across the board.

Edited January 22, 2015 by MartGonzo

[rynak]

Things like cockpits do not really lend themselves to scaling... because for a larger cockpit, different aspects of the cockpit (i.e. windows vs rest) should scale differently. Instead of going down the road to hell in trying to find an algo for this, making them handcrafted is just fine. It also allows more flexibility with regards to stats (a procedural part commands than an algo has to scale the attributes).

I see no problem with keeping those kinds of parts unique. It's tanks, batteries, wings, boosters and so on, where the partcount is just stupid, and if you consider the clutter in the part catalog, then constantly having to search for parts in the editor, might very well counterweight all the benefits of having no scaling UI.

Really, i think their reason simply is backwards compatibility.

[Alshain]

I certainly don't want to remove anything we have now. I believe the devs at one point said they would be open to a TweakScale like implementation for structural parts (girders, panels, non-fuel adapters, and the like) which makes absolute sense. I'm not sure if that was an off the cuff comment or a real desire to do it, so don't take that as any kind of confirmation.

I think fuel tanks could use it too but more like what B9 has for contents of the tank than TweakScale. Let's say I'm building a Mk1 space plane, it would be nice to be able to use the textures designed to match the Mk 1 cockpit that Porkjet made, but they are LF only, so I have to use the not so fitting tank parts that have LFO or I can't go to space. I want to be able to right click and change it to an LFO tank, which would reduce the total LF in order to fit the Oxidizer.

[Motokid600]

Something has to be done to optimize memory usage...

[TheCanadianVendingMachine]

Something has to be done to optimize memory usage...

Maybe, just maybe, you can wait until Unity 5

[TeeGee]

Maybe, just maybe, you can wait until Unity 5

Is unity 5 really going to solve all this games problems?

[sal_vager]

You'd need a time machine to find out for absolutely certain TeeGee.

[Tuareg]

Is unity 5 really going to solve all this games problems?

unity will not write ksp instead of squad they just provide the tool ksp can still suck