For everyone learning or teaching

[Pecan]

I have learnt a valuable lesson this week about the importance of humility when teaching, KSP specifically.  We have a lot of new people playing KSP just now and (fingers crossed) a lot of people helping them.  With luck this will benefit, or at least amuse. all of you.

There are people from several countries staying here, some of whom are interested in astronomy and/or other aspects of space science.  We had a session recently watching 'The Sky At Night' about the Juno probe going into orbit around Jupiter.  At the end, one of the questions was "Can you do anything like that in KSP?", to which the answer is "Yes, of course.  We just need to design our required final satellite payload and the necessary launch/transfer vehicle(s)".  Two hours later, thanks to time-warp but no thanks to time spent explaining dV, Isp, etc. our SCANSat satellite neatly closed its orbit around Laythe (they chose it) with a comfortable 350-ish m/s dV remaining.  Everyone happy,

Until this week, when they started playing KSP themselves.  See, I'd told them to start small by putting a satellite into orbit around Kerbin.  As we all know, that's something that anyone can do in their own-designed vehicles, first time, every time.  NOT!  ^^.  I had made several huge mistakes, including (feel free to point out more, I deserve the ignominy):

1. Mainly, I'd made multi-stage, multi-manoeuvre-plus-gravity-assist, interplanetary look too easy, raising false expectations in themselves of what they 'should' be able to do.
2. "Just" getting to orbit then seemed really trivial to them.
3. And most of them didn't put in a lot of thought or extra reading ('cause it's easy, right?)
4. So failures felt to them like big, personal, ****-ups or game-issues.
5. Failure, frustration, annoyance abounded.

We've been chatting again tonight and I apologised for not having told them (enough):

1. This is easy ... after 3,500+ hours of practice!
2. Anyone than can do it on request, in front of an audience and after a couple of bottles of wine, probably has several-hundred to 1,000 hours in.
3. Getting to orbit is the hardest part.
4. Knowing where to look-up the required information (transfer window, dV requirements) is most of the rest.
5. Keeping it low-mass is the critical trick.

To all you just getting to grips with KSP (on whatever platform):

1. Getting to orbit in your own ship is hard.
2. You will fail many times.
3. If we give you a ship perfectly designed for the job ...
4. ... you will still fail (at least) several times
5. ... and when you do make it you will neither feel so good about it, nor understand half the reasons why you failed before.
6. Once you can get to orbit you are "halfway to anywhere" (Robert Heinlein), 'cause it's that hard compared to the 'space-travel' bit.
7. You don't have to do it all yourself; read/watch tutorials about how to do it.
8. EVERYONE who can reliably go interplanetary, from scratch, in a couple of hours, has failed many, many times - and probably still fails sometimes - 'just' getting to orbit.
9. Because, just in case you haven't got the message yet, it's hard and you're going to fail.
10. The only real failure is failing to learn.
11. After your milestone achievement in orbiting, you will fail at re-entry, landing, lunar- or interplanetary-transfers and, especially, rendezvous and docking.
12. So did everyone else.  It's what KSP is about.
13. Which means you can do it too.
14. "Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm" (Churchill).

Take-home message is JFK's, "We choose to do these things ... not because they are easy but because they are hard", that's where the sense of achievement comes from.

[Lich180]

I played KSP on pc (just the demo) a while ago, and when it went to consoles I bought it day 1. I've spent the last week building, rebuilding, looking up information, trawling forums for tips, and avoiding YouTube walkthroughs like the Black Death.

I've killed Jeb many times, stranded him in space 3-4 times (EVA accidents in space), and made orbit yesterday and a Mun flyby today. Still working on the "land safely" part afterwards, but I'm learning.

Still trying to learn the delta v calculations, and have to do em by hand since I can't mod, but doing well.

Probably helps that I play Dwarf Fortress, so I'm used to total failure. 

[Xavven]

I know this problem all too well -- I'm in charge of our training program at work. To an experienced practitioner of anything, whether it be a game, job skill, or other activity, many of the basics are such second nature to them that they forget that it took hundreds or thousands of repetitions to gain that implicit memory (aka "muscle memory") and often don't remember the exact pitfalls they used to experience while trying to learn. They end up trying to teach their student how to run before they even know how to crawl, so to speak.

Oddly enough, sometimes a person who just very recently mastered a beginner concept can be a better teacher than a grand-master expert (on that topic at least), as s/he remembers common beginner mistakes and their related fixes from more recent memory.

In short, teachers should strive to constantly learn how to be better teachers

Edited July 20, 2016 by Xavven

[Pecan]

13 hours ago, Lich180 said:

...I've killed Jeb many times, stranded him in space 3-4 times (EVA accidents in space), and made orbit yesterday and a Mun flyby today ... I'm learning.

... Still trying to learn the delta v calculations, and have to do em by hand since I can't mod, but doing well.

Probably helps that I play Dwarf Fortress, so I'm used to total failure. 

Way to go :-)
You've made it to orbit and to Mun - wasn't the Mun-trip much simpler than getting into orbit in the first place?

Stick the dV calculation in a spreadsheet or similar:
dV = (Isp * 9.81) * LN(Wet/Dry)
which means ...
dV = (engine efficiency * g) * natural logaritm of (mass with fuel / mass without fuel)
which means...
You can do more stuff if you have more fuel and more-efficient engines.  Not a difficult concept *grin*
and ...
engine efficiency (Isp) is shown in pop-up window when you mouse-over an engine in the VAB/SPH parts-list - most of us use the vacuum efficiency for everything except launch.
'g'(ravity) is a constant just used to convert the units into m/s
Using the natural log shows 'diminishing returns' as you add more and more fuel to a vehicle - this is 'the tyranny of the rocket equation' and is why we can't just build anything as big/powerful as we want.  http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition30/tryanny.html gives the NASA/ISS view of the matter.
mass with fuel is shown in the VAB/SPH as you build a vehicle.
mass without fuel can be shown in the VAB/SPH by right-clicking each fuel tank (tweaking) and removing the fuel.

Failure is fun!

 

[regex]

16 hours ago, Pecan said:

To all you just getting to grips with KSP (on whatever platform):

15. If you want to try something that is done IRL (for instance, a solid-motor upper) just try it.  Don't come to the forums and ask whether it's a good idea or not, just explore it.  There are too many jaded people here concerned only about efficiency rather than exploring spaceflight concepts that will simply poop in your cornflakes.

16. Remember, you can get pretty much anything to orbit with enough experience and patience.

[Lich180]

51 minutes ago, Pecan said:

Way to go :-)
You've made it to orbit and to Mun - wasn't the Mun-trip much simpler than getting into orbit in the first place?

Oh yeah, after I'm in orbit it's all much easier. Still not proficient at getting into a stable orbit, I think maybe 1/5 attempts actually end up with a decent orbit. I either go too high and sharp, or too low and wide, or just screw up the orbital maneuver or launch itself.

Also having issues actually making it back to the ground on Kerbin after the Mun flyby. Probably could practice on Sandbox mode, but I'm having more fun trying to make things work in Career

Thanks for the info, Pecan!

[pandaman]

I'll add to the excellent point that @regex said above.

15a.  If you want to try ANYTHING, whether done IRL or not , give it a whirl. Nothing to lose, but your time playing that you were using playing anyway.  'Nothing ventured, nothing gained', if it fails you can learn from it, to either improve your design or techniques, or give up and try a different approach.  Either way you learnt something useful.

Having said that - NEVER be afraid to ask for hints, tips or advice on these forums, or to share your successes and failures.  We have all failed spectacularly at some point, and we all will again, you are not alone, and we can (and do) all learn from each other.  I have picked up loads of tips and inspiration from these forums, a lot of that from much newer players than myself talking about what they achieved or asking what they consider silly questions that raised brilliant replies and discussions.

Above all though, enjoy yourself, it's a game after all.

[steuben]

19 minutes ago, regex said:

15. If you want to try something that is done IRL (for instance, a solid-motor upper) just try it.  Don't come to the forums and ask whether it's a good idea or not, just explore it.  There are too many jaded people here concerned only about efficiency rather than exploring spaceflight concepts that will simply poop in your cornflakes.

 

Yes and no. It depends on the question that is asked, and the answers given.
ex. Q1 Can I use a solid rocket motor for a final stage?

A1: Can yes. Should... I think a solid-motor final is not a good idea. Too fiddly to figure out exact amount of fuel, mass, some control issues, my own control style, possible over/short burn. Maybe as a second last stage.. but then the mass is still an issue

A2: no. l2p n00b

Q2 I want to use a solid rocket for the last stage on a satellite. What should I know about trying this?

A1: It's fiddly to figure out exact amount of fuel. Then there is mass, some control issues, your flight style will be a factor, possible over/short burn. Maybe as a second last stage.. but then the mass is still an issue.

A2: dumb idea. l2p n00b

And sometimes the effort to try it, or the design variants required, exceed the skill, knowledge, and/or time of a player. Eve return for example, though that is high end difficult. And sometimes it is to shortcut the process, to borrow from calculus, am I approaching a local min/max with this or a global min/max?

Quote

16. Remember, you can get pretty much anything to orbit with enough experience and patience.

No. With enough boosters your can get everything to orbit. Ain't necessarily going to be a clean or simple launch, but it'll be up there.

[wumpus]

A few more notes:

While I learned to get to orbit long before beta (back when "gravity turn" meant "go fast, then turn East"), I still think rendezvous/docking is much harder than learning to orbit.  Of course, I still remember the joy and wonder I felt as I saw the trajectory pop out of Kerbin, showing that I was going to stay up!

Fortunately they seem to have fixed of most of the "going into space" difficulties (this was probably harder than orbiting in 1.0.0).  I just tested a few means "of getting into space" and only an early attempt (with 250km height) got Jeb killed, the rest were hair raising, but safely landed (if you want to call a <1sec "safe" window to hit the chutes "safe").

I will admit that orbit seems much harder then when I learned.  My preferred "no brainer" orbital craft (mainly uses a BACC single stage) has been nerfed into tricky measures (use launch clamps to get off the pad at an angle) and it took two tries to get up with a similar "no brainer" liquid fuel rocket (and even then had barely any delta-v to return).  One nice thing is that with a decent (30km) entry pe, you at least have plenty of time to hit the parachute button (considering how much the player has invested into getting into orbit, it would be nasty to kill Jeb now).

What makes orbit so hard is that you both have to build a rocket that will get there, and correctly pilot your rocket (the second wasn't a big deal when many forumites first did the job).  You might want a "class built" (with at least some means of checking the rocket equation.  If that means the teacher plugging numbers into a cell phone calc app, so be it) rocket to practice getting into orbit.  Perhaps an unmanned job (make sure you include extra reaction wheels, those probes are wimpy) and then let the class build a rocket to get Jeb/Val into space.

If you are teaching a class, it might make sense to show a clip (I'm sure there is one on youtube) of the early history of the Vanguard program.  That 4" flight was one of the better ones (later ones did a lot of damage).  Going into space means blowing up a bunch of rockets (spacex was both lucky and good: they only blew up three falcon[1]s before going into orbit.  They also pretty much admit that if they blew up the fourth, they would have gone out of business).

Edited July 20, 2016 by wumpus

[regex]

2 hours ago, steuben said:

Can yes. Should...

Should?  Always.  Never let someone tell you that something is dumb, not worth it, or that you should "l2p nub".  KSP is about trying and learning, exploring spaceflight concepts.  Newbies should try things for themselves and decide for themselves.

[FyunchClick]

1 hour ago, regex said:

Should?  Always.  Never let someone tell you that something is dumb, not worth it, or that you should "l2p nub".  KSP is about trying and learning, exploring spaceflight concepts.  Newbies should try things for themselves and decide for themselves.

I rarely if ever see someone on this forum tell something is dumb, most just offer some friendly advice on improvements.

Secondly, I've seen a ton of protip answers to newbie questions that made me scratch my ears and rethink my habits and convictions and understanding of what's going on, and that still occasionally happens even to this day with several thousand hours under my belt.

Thirdly, as a completely lost newbie for the first several hundred hours, lurking those questions and their answers really helped me get the hang of more advanced techniques, and I presume it does the same for people jumping on board now.

You're of course free to play the game you like it, relying on your own ingenuity to figure everything out. Me, I'm rather glad with newbie questions.

[Provisional Name 12]

20 hours ago, Lich180 said:

I played KSP on pc (just the demo) a while ago, and when it went to consoles I bought it day 1. I've spent the last week building, rebuilding, looking up information, trawling forums for tips, and avoiding YouTube walkthroughs like the Black Death.

I've killed Jeb many times, stranded him in space 3-4 times (EVA accidents in space), and made orbit yesterday and a Mun flyby today. Still working on the "land safely" part afterwards, but I'm learning.

Still trying to learn the delta v calculations, and have to do em by hand since I can't mod, but doing well.

I could never play on console and I have to admit your doing pretty good to manage it. Other than maybe the opportunity to use a joystick for flight navigation I see no advantage. In fact just the limitation of not having KER means having to do all the delta-v calculations manually and switching through screens for info much more than should be necessary. So hats off to you.

3 hours ago, wumpus said:

While I learned to get to orbit long before beta (back when "gravity turn" meant "go fast, then turn East"), I still think rendezvous/docking is much harder than learning to orbit.

What? I mean at current rendesvous is basically the easiest thing in game (unless the maneuver nodes start bugging out), probably easier than landing on kerbin and docking while not easy to learn is pretty simple once you know how to target the docking port and use control from here.

[StrandedonEarth]

17. With Kerbal, failing, and failing spectacularly, is half the fun!

 

3 hours ago, steuben said:

With enough boosters your can get everything to orbit

Wehrner von Kerman couldn't have said it better himself! And I think I hear Jeb drooling in the background...

[something]

The first thing you have to learn is to get in orbit. To do so, you need to learn how much dV you need and how to build a rocket that is stable enough to reach orbit. Docking, consequently is relatively easy as you just have to learn how to dock

It takes several hours of gameplay to achieve that and I do have to admit that I am seriously surprised there's still ocean east of the KSP (and no giant underwater junkyard [although, I wonder where Jeb gets all those parts from]).

[regex]

1 hour ago, FyunchClick said:

Me, I'm rather glad with newbie questions.

I'm not talking about newbie questions but rather the answering thereof.  I've seen people on these forums outright discourage someone from trying something because it wasn't "the best way" or "the most effecient way".  I would much rather see people say something like "try it!" because to me that's what KSP is about: exploration.

Tips and advice are one thing, but there's no single best way to do something nor should any methods be discouraged, especially in light of previous statements RE: more boosters.

[Pecan]

Yep, regex - Pandaman said it first here and it's another mistake to add to my list.  I forgot to say:

5 hours ago, pandaman said:

Above all though, enjoy yourself, it's a game after all.

And that includes "just trying it" because it seems like a blast (one way or another, it probably will be, hehe).

[Superfluous J]

3 hours ago, regex said:

Should?  Always.

Hear, hear. Who cares if it's wrong? At the end when you see that it's wrong, what have you lost? Time? You were going to lose that time anyway and this way you learned something instead of just getting to Mun again or whatever else you were going to do in the game instead.

The big secret about KSP is that it has nothing to do with getting to these places or doing science or career mode or anything like that. It has to do with learning things and developing skills. You can only go so far following others' orders. Eventually you just gotta try stuff for yourself.

[SorryDave]

As an experienced player, I wish I could forget everything and start again. The first several months of playing KSP was the best time I ever had in any game.

It's probably worth reinforcing this before helping other players when they struggle with some challenge that is frustrating them.

[SpacedCowboy]

11 hours ago, regex said:

15. If you want to try something that is done IRL (for instance, a solid-motor upper) just try it.  Don't come to the forums and ask whether it's a good idea or not, just explore it.  There are too many jaded people here concerned only about efficiency rather than exploring spaceflight concepts that will simply poop in your cornflakes.

16. Remember, you can get pretty much anything to orbit with enough experience and patience.

Uh, oh,,, I think I've been eating cocoa puffs

[Curveball Anders]

23 hours ago, regex said:

Should?  Always.  Never let someone tell you that something is dumb, not worth it, or that you should "l2p nub".  KSP is about trying and learning, exploring spaceflight concepts.  Newbies should try things for themselves and decide for themselves.

I almost agree.

IM(nv)HO, KSP is about having fun.

The eventual learning and exploring of spaceflight concepts is a sneaky side effect

[Bloojay]

On 7/19/2016 at 5:38 PM, Pecan said:

EVERYONE who can reliably go interplanetary, from scratch, in a couple of hours, has failed many, many times - and probably still fails sometimes - 'just' getting to orbit.

*raises glass* HERE HERE!

[ToukieToucan]

I remember trying to dock for many frustrating hours but it was very satisfying when I did dock.

Without failure success seems boring: imagine trying to dock for the first time and being able to dock without effort, it wouldn't feel like a big accomplishment.

[John FX]

I remember learning to dock, it used to take between 2-3 hours to launch two craft and dock them. I carried on and eventually I was making space stations using the method of zeroing my relative motion, aligning the docking ports then slowly heading for the docking port.

After a few weeks of this I found RCS in the parts menu...

[Corona688]

Docking isn't easy, as much as it's easy to practice.

Rocket doesn't get enough delta-V?  Revert, hit space and wait several minutes.  It's a slow process.

Miss your docking manuever?  No need to revert, no waiting involved, just try and try again until it works.

There's also a few ways of doing it, whereas delta V is kind of an immutable wall.

Edited August 3, 2016 by Corona688

[TheKosanianMethod]

On 7/20/2016 at 0:10 PM, Pecan said:

Failure is fun!

...But success is sweeter!

This pretty much sums up KSP:

Failure.

That is the point of the game.

The fact that failing is learning, learning is fun, learning by failure is even more fun, and challenges can be overcome by failure, from a math problem to a chemical equation, to an orbital transfer. This why we accept challenges, and beat them.