SkyRender

It's a nice mod, but the button to adjust the resolution seems to only appear at the Space Center screen for me and nowhere else. Using Stock toolbar option if that matters.

If you don't know, KSP has a very blatant issue where, upon doing ANYTHING with the keyboard or mouse during loading screens, the game will forcibly switch the resolution to whatever the in-use monitor's maximum resolution is. For a 4K monitor, this means 3840x2160. This is extremely problematic since the UI scaling options only work for about 50% of the UI elements, resulting in not being able to see a lot of critical on-screen panels. I'm sure it would result in a sizeable performance hit for many users too. Has there been any workaround found besides "don't touch your controls in any way, shape or form during loading screens"? Because that's not a very good workaround. (I do know about AnyRes, but I'm looking for a stock solution if one exists, and AnyRes is a Band-Aid-on-a-gaping-wound kind of solution anyway).

For my Hitchhiker's Guide to Kerbals and my ongoing Dunaverse story, there's already names for at least two continents. (Since all major landmasses on Kerbin are interconnected, you kind of have to define "continent" to mean "large areas between land bridges".) The continent that the Kerbal Space Center is on is called Lovotrazi (and the nation behind the KSC is called Lovothoria). The continent with the desert is called Devatrazi (and has its own nation, Devathoria). Haven't come up with names for the badlands continent or the trailing western continent beside the badlands.

You are the hero that KSP submariners need. Thank you.

Someone let Danny2462 know pronto! If anyone can squeeze comedy out of it, he can.

Prototyping for the mission to come after the Dunaverse. I'm sure this design form factor will seem familiar to at least a few folks!

They happen a lot on Kerbin since the Mun and Kerbin are perfectly aligned with the sun. I seem to recall that it's not quite a daily occurrence, but certainly it happens at least once every Munar day.

My personal breakdown of KSP's eras are similar, but distinct since I was playing this game since 0.11 and have a LOT of memories of its earliest builds: The Before-Times (pre-development): KSP was merely a concept. Pre-Public Era (0.7.2 and earlier): Initial development, nobody saw anything about this era save what HarvesteR shared years ago about it. Prototype Era (0.7.3 to 0.13.3): Earliest development, most of the releases during this stretch were focused on fleshing out and stabilizing the base game itself. Local Era (0.14 to 0.16): Development expanded to make space exploration around Kerbin more interesting (as well as add atmospheric flight). This era introduced us to quite a few staples, including the EVA. Interplanetary Era (0.17 to 0.21.1): Focus shifted to developing the solar system, adding numerous planets and moons. We also saw the emergence of many features related to this, including flags and maneuver nodes. Career Beta Era (0.22 to 0.90): Though officially only 0.90 was a beta version, the fact of the matter is that the tone and focus of KSP shifted massively starting with 0.22 when the first aspects of Career mode were implemented. Most of Career mode's staples emerged during this era. Early Release Era (1.0 to 1.1.3): The first officially complete version of KSP and its various updates to enhance stability and accessibility afterward. Feature Creep Era (1.2 to 1.7.3): New features started being added, various bug fixes, and tweaks all over the place. (I personally missed most of this era due to burning out on KSP for a time... Going over release history, I didn't miss that much, though.) Facelift Era (1.8 to present): During this time, updates began to trickle in to improve the visual quality of the various planet and moon surfaces. We also saw the addition of a number of quality-of-life features as well, and a few small gameplay additions. Technically this era won't be over until all celestial bodies have received a facelift (or until they stop doing facelifts), but it's hard to deny that 1.11 was almost an era-maker on its own with everything EVA construction and enhanced inventory added to the game.

I remember being pretty excited about the Mun being added for 0.12. Finally, somewhere to go besides just to orbit! Not that I got to orbit in 0.11, I was still in the "haha rocket go boom" phase back then. 0.14 was the first big game-changer update, I remember being stoked about being able to actually save my flights in progress. 0.18 was kind of the "legendary release" back in the day. Since it added docking, it expanded our possibilities so much! It was wonky and unreliable back then, but it was still awesome. Most of Scott Manley's most popular KSP videos came out during the stretch of 0.17 to 0.22, and the bulk of the really interesting ones were during 0.18. Ditto for Danny2462. It was, to sum up, my favorite KSP release series. 0.22 was the first Science mode update (though back then it was called Career mode), and it was a blast actually having something to do besides just go to the other planets and moons because we could. 0.24 was the first "real" Career mode update, and when we started seeing Funds be a thing. It was definitely something! 0.90 was exciting mostly because we knew that 1.0 was right around the corner. 1.0 was definitely the big one! Most of the core features we know and love today were perfected or implemented for that version. Kinda lost interest in KSP for ages after 1.2 came out, right on up 'til 1.8 and Breaking Ground came around. That was a heck of a release, though hardly nostalgic at this point since it was only a year and a half ago!

I too would appreciate a decent ballast system. Perhaps when active the ballast would cause the buoyancy of the craft's collective parts to be set to the inverse of (90% * ballast setting). Not especially realistic, but it would serve the fundamental purpose of allowing a craft to sink or float at a controllable rate. Seems like that would be a fairly simple mod to make, but I don't know nearly enough about KSP modding to do it myself...

The Dunaverse continues! The south pole awaits, as does a little surprise in space...

No amount of effort to decode the corrupted logs seems to have helped. We are once again presenting the relevant data as-is. KSD 2049.2 (Eveday, November 11th 1895) - Duna's Surface We're finally rested enough to make our polar expedition. It was a tense few days, I must say! We caught up on the two weeks of news reports we'd missed, and things were pretty bad on Kerbin for a while there. Prime Minister Atis was very nearly deposed in the coup attempt by the Devathorian extremists, and there were a number of skirmishes on the borders between the nations. The only reason things calmed down was because the former king of Devathoria made a call for peace. Apparently the extremists are royalists and want the old king back on the throne, but I don't think that's going to happen. The old king is in very poor health, after all, and has stated that he will maintain his exile to Lovothoria until his dying day. Karman was pretty upset about the news, but Jonbert's reaction was probably the most disturbing. He went into a huge rant about his faithless fellow Devathorians, a total reversal of his ranting a few weeks back about how he wanted the royal family back in power. Did something change his mind? I mean I'd be pretty keen to swap sides if something like that happened among the people I had once thought to be my supporters, but I'm not Jonbert. Pholie seemed relieved to learn that the Prime Minister was still alive, but seemed disinterested otherwise. I guess she's too young to appreciate the severity of what happened. I finally figured out where I'd seen that strange symbol on our corrupted reports before! The mark on Pholie's neck looks the same. Well, sort of. It's hard to really tell for sure, but there's definitely a similarity. That's one mystery solved, I guess. I was right, it was just a really weird coincidence! ERROR: Entry corruption was detected. Correction failed. KSD 2052.0 (Dresday, November 14th 1895) - Duna's Surface Ny'x ajwd htqi itbs mjwj. Ymj xnlsfq bfx htrnsl kwtr f xywfslj mnqq, fsi ny'x jrnyynsl ts ymj xfrj kwjvzjshd fx ymfy rfxy fsyjssf kwtr gjktwj. Ny'x tsqd f xqnlmyqd inkkjwjsy xnlsfq, fsi ny'x gjnsl inwjhyji ytbfwi Pjwgns. Ymj ywfsxrnxxnts nx sty gjnsl gwtfihfxy bnym sjfwqd jstzlm utbjw yt wjfhm Pjwgns, mtbjajw. N btsijw nk ymj ybt bjwj rjfsy yt btwp ytljymjw twnlnsfqqd? YWFSXRNXXNTS UWTYTHTQ 312415 FHYNAJ GWTFIHFXYNSL TS HMFSSJQ 3845871ME WJHJNANSL MFWIBFWJ IJYJHYJI, NIJSYNKDNSL... ZSFGQJ YT NIJSYNKD TWNLNS XUJHNJX HMJHPNSL HTRUZYJW XDXYJRX TK WJHJNANSL MFWIBFWJ... IJYJHYJI UWTOJHY PJWGFQ IFYF XYTWNSL XNLSFQ YT HTRUZYJW XDXYJRX... IZUQNHFYJ IFYF IJYJHYJI, FSFQDENSL... HTSKNWRJI YWFSXRNXXNTS KWTR HTRUTSJSY 6596 ST JWWTWX IJYJHYJI NS IFYF WJYZWSNSL YT GWTFIHFXY RTIJ KSD 2065.1 (Eveday, November 27th 1895) - Duna's Surface It's hard to deny that this is a momentous day, even though in the grand scheme of things it's just the 53rd day of our mission here at Duna. Today was the expiration of being able to invoke Contingency 31, our emergency return window to Kerbin. At this point our earliest departure date is a full year away, which would involve invoking Contingency 43. For all intents and purposes it's identical to C31, and far too late if anything goes wrong in the intervening year. We're here for the long haul now. Jeb and Val, naturally, were unflapped by this. I don't think they'd care if we were doomed to die here, honestly, they're having the time of their lives on Duna. As for Bill, Bob, and Jonbert, they're all pretty melancholy right now. I know for a fact that Jonbert's homesick, he left his wife and daughter behind to run this mission. By the time we get back, little Allie will nearly be an adult. As for Pholie, she's become overly focused on her work, and generally doesn't want to talk about anything else. I guess that's just how she copes. As for Karman, well, I'm not at liberty to discuss that in the mission logs. Suffice it to say that we've found ways to cope with the reality of our situation together. KSD 2065.4 (Eveday, November 27th 1895) - Duna's Surface There was an unscheduled docking up at the station; we got word of it from the station's automated systems. The fuel ferry from Ike isn't scheduled to arrive today, and mission control isn't telling us what this is about either. We have been instructed to return to the station as soon as possible, however. I hope it's not a system malfunction, or worse, an impactor. We'll be finding out soon enough... KSD 2065.5 (Eveday, November 27th 1895) - Low Duna Orbit There is a Contingency 128. As it turns out, the boffins didn't like the idea of leaving us potentially stranded for over a year at Duna, at the mercy of life support sustaining systems that could fail at any time. So about two weeks after the Dunaverse launches concluded, a sixth launch was done. The nuclear-engine-powered ship that's arrived is loaded with another 355 days' worth of life support, as well as enough delta-V to get us back to Kerbin at any time (though life support is only assured for a window of 150 days from now and about 150 days after that, should the greenhouses, water recyclers, or air recyclers fail). It even includes the latest version of the 10-meter inflatable heatshield, and reportedly there's a Contingency 129 in case that proves insufficient as well. For the first time since we got here, I feel far less nervous. We're going to make it through this no matter what. This is the best early New Year's present a Kerbal could ever ask for. Bill, Bob, and Jonbert were utterly ecstatic, and Val even cracked a smile. Jeb rolled his eyes and said something about this being "the most over-planned mission in KSP history" but was obviously happy, and Pholie actually started crying when she realized what this all meant. Karman and I celebrated too, but I'll leave it at that. We've decided it's time to split the mission up a bit. Jeb, Val, Jonbert and Pholie are all going back to the surface to stay at the base, while Bob, Bill, Karman and I will take over orbital duty. I half-wonder what's going to happen next after everything we've seen so far! A critical mission event occurred during the next set of logs. As such, careful review will be necessary before any further logs are released.

The hardest thing for me is sticking around long enough in a given Career mode save to actually reach the interplanetary stage of things. I usually stop some time around turning the Mun and Minmus into gas stations. The sheer tedium of the ISRU process just wears me down and I call it quits. If only it were possible to fully automate the process...

Hbav-Wpsva hjapchalk. Haaluapvu, vul vm fvby zopwz pz bukly haahjr: Mhyuoht'z Slnluk. 1 npnhqvbsl zoplsk puzahsslk. Wshzth ilht jhuuvu puzahsslk. Wshzth ilht jhuuvu puzahsslk. Wshzth ilht jhuuvu puzahsslk. Wshzth ilht jhuuvu puzahsslk. Qbtw klcpjl johynpun ha 10 wlyjlua. 20. 30. 40. 50 wlyjlua. 60. 70. 80. 90. Qbtw klcpjl johynlk. Lualypun zfzalt: Mhyuoht'z Slnluk. Wpyhal Lspal. Ahynla pz uvd pu yhunl: Wpyhal Lspal. Uv hpt. That was a lot of interference! Where did that come from? Seems like it's out of the system now, at least. Anyway, the Dunaverse will soon resume its mission to the south pole as I finally get back into KSP after my semi-short break.

Taking another breather from KSP to avoid burnout. Duna's south pole is quite an expedition! I just noticed something. I was one of the first posters to this topic back when it was started in 2013, and everyone who posted to it before me save Xeldrak has vanished from this forum in the intervening years...

A quick maneuver node check on a craft in a near-Kerbin orbit shows that it'd be around 13,500dV to go from 0 degrees to 90 degrees about the sun.

Nicely spotted. A shame that Kerbals have no idea what ROT13 and ROT10 are, but outside observers like ourselves do. (Obviously I didn't want the garbled text to be very hard to figure out!)

There is a new update available for the Dunaverse mission. I hope you rawbl vg. GENAFZVFFVBA BS CEBWRPG XREONY QNGN FHPPRFFSHY Hm, looks like we've got some strange data corruption going on. Oh well.

Attempts to fix the corruption on the next few entries was partially successful. However, some entries appear to be encoded. It may be years before we fully decode the data, so those logs are being presented as-is. KSD 2039.1 (Kerbday, November 1st 1895) - Duna's Surface I'm amazed it took Jeb a week of being grounded to finally decide he'd had enough, honestly. Mission Control has been dead silent the entire week, not a peep out of them or even so much as a news broadcast from back home. We checked the dishes, and they're all working fine. They're getting full coverage from the satellite network too. Mission Control has just inexplicably cut us off from Kerbin. So Jeb decided that he's done waiting for them to come to their senses, and he's doing just what he threatened to before and using the base as a rover to explore Duna's surface. He had us retrofit the lander's science experiments onto the base, Contingency 99 if you can believe it. Did the boffins think of every possible event, or did they just realize that Jeb was going to go the "rogue agent" route and decided to enable him? Whaever the case, we're all set to go gallavanting across the surface of Duna to our heart's content. We could potentially circumnavigate the planet if we wanted, we have more than enough life support and supplies to do so. Jeb, however, has a specific destination in mind. Apparently during the quiet of the last few days, Bob managed to isolate a strange signal coming from a crater off to the northwest of us. It's a long drive, it'll probably take at least a day and a half, but I'm curious about what the signal could be. KSD 2041.0 (Eveday, November 3rd 1895) - Duna's Surface ERROR: Entry corruption was detected. Correction failed. Jung vf guvf guvat? Vg ybbxf yvxr n Xreony snpr. Gurer'f ab bgure jnl gb qrfpevor vg, va snpg. Vg'f uhtr, gbb. Jrer jr zrnag gb svaq guvf guvat? Vg'f tvivat bss na vafnaryl cbjreshy enqvb genafzvffvba, Ovyy naq Cubyvr erpbeqrq gur jubyr guvat naq ner gelvat gb qrpbqr vg. V qba'g yvxr vg urer bar ovg, V'ir unq n fcyvggvat urnqnpur rire fvapr jr neevirq. Gur fbbare jr trg bhg bs urer, gur orggre. CYNARG XFF04 ERCBEG - HASVG SBE UNOVGNGVBA NANYLFVF BS ARKG CYNARG VF UNF ORRA FPURQHYRQ GREENSBEZVAT JVYY PBZZRAPR VS AB INYVQ PNAQVQNGR VF SBHAQ CEBWRPG XREONY CEBPRRQVAT GB CYNA NYREG! XREONY CERFRAPR QRGRPGRQ! RKRPHGVAT CEBPRQHER 478589 VA NPPBEQNAPR JVGU CEBWRPG CNENZRGREF VAGRESNPVAT JVGU XREONY PBZCHGREF CNEGVNYYL FHPPRFFSHY ERPBEQ GENAFSRE VA CEBTERFF QNGN UNF ORRA FHPPRFFSHYYL GENAFSREERQ REEBE: HANOYR GB GENAFSRE PVCURE XRL PNYPHYNGVAT CEBONOVYVGL BS XREONYF QVFPBIREVAT PVCURE... CEBONOVYVGL QRGREZVARQ GB OR 100% JVGUVA 100 LRNEF GUVF ERFHYG VF JVGUVA NPPRCGNOYR ZVFFVBA CNENZRGREF KSD 2041.3 (Eveday, November 3rd 1895) - Duna's Surface ERROR: Entry corrupton was detected. Correction was partially successful. V guvax jr'er mostly away from gung zbahzrag now. It zvtug fgvyy or causing some interference, gubhtu. Hopefully once jr'er sne rabhtu away, that will fgbc. Bhe next destination vf sne gb gur southeast, another signal gung Obo vfbyngrq. I hope it's yrff qvfehcgvir than this bar jnf! KSD 2042.2 (Mohoday, November 4th 1895) - Duna's Surface We're definitely far enough away now! Jeb decided to park us for the Dunan night, and I can't blame him one bit. That monument really shook us all up. What is something like that doing here on Duna? Bob and Jonbert are going to analyze the signal it was broadcasting while we wait for daylight. Karman showed me something strange about our footage. It came out garbled, and a strange symbol keeps showing up all over it. That symbol looks familiar somehow, but it's hard to tell since it's faded, jitters all over the place, and keeps getting rotated about. Where have I seen it before? As if I needed more paranoia fuel, right? It's probably just a coincidence, whatever it is. I checked my own mission logs, and disturbingly, they seem to be damaged. Even more bizarre, however, is that I cannot for the life of me remember what I wrote in them before it got garbled. I think that... thing... must have messed with our memories too. I swear that parts of it I didn't even write. We're going to the second anomaly once it's daylight again. I hope it isn't so disturbing. KSD 2044.4 (Dresday, November 6th 1895) - Duna's Surface ERROR: Entry corruption was detected. Correction failed. Mu vekdt iecu iehj ev tulysu. Jxu iywdqb yj'i rheqtsqijydw yi luho tyvvuhudj vhec jxu ejxuh edu. Yj iuuci byau yj cywxj xqlu q lyikqb secfedudj? Yj'i xqht je iqo veh ikhu. Y zkij xefu mu sqd wuj qmqo vhec yj ieed. Co xuqt xkhji ulud mehiu qhekdt jxyi jxydw jxqd yj tyt qj jxu wyqdj Auhrqb xuqt... JHQDICYIIYED FHEJESEB 312415 QSJYLU RHEQTSQIJYDW ED SXQDDUB 3845871XP HUSUYLYDW XQHTMQHU TUJUSJUT, YTUDJYVOYDW... KDQRBU JE YTUDJYVO EHYWYD IFUSYUI SXUSAYDW SECFKJUH IOIJUCI EV HUSUYLYDW XQHTMQHU... TUJUSJUT FHEZUSJ AUHRQB TQJQ IJEHYDW IYWDQB JE SECFKJUH IOIJUCI... IJEHQWU SECFBUJU SQBSKBQJYDW ETTI EV TUSETYDW RQIUT ED SKHHUDJ JUSXDEBEWYSQB QTLQDSUCUDJ... 100% SXQDSU EV TUSETYDW MYJXYD 100 OUQHI JXYI HUIKBJ YI MYJXYD QSSUFJQRBU FQHQCUJUHI KSD 2046.1 (Eelooday, November 8th 1895) - Duna's Surface The last few days have been the strangest of my life. Just like with that weird rock face, the strange metal device that was embedded in a rock corrupted our reports on it too. And once again, I cannot remember what my logs said before they got corrupted. What is going on with this planet? Anyway, I think Jeb's drive to explore is sated, at least for now. Bill and Bob managed to find another faint signature close to the south pole, but all four of us new recruits veto'd any further expeditions at least for a few days. If what we saw at the other two sites is any indicator, we do not want to approach whatever is waiting for us down south without a nice, long rest... Mission Control finally got back in contact with us. Apparently they went offline due to the Space Center being occupied by militants from Devathoria. How did the Devathorian militants get that far into Lovothoria, though? Anyway, the occupation failed and the troops were deported back to their homeland, so things have calmed down back on Kerbin. Gene and the others were very relieved to know that we're still alive, and gave Jeb the go-ahead to explore the south pole in a few days. The Ike fuel ferry sent us a message too, letting us know that it's about half full now, so Contingency 31 is back on the table if we need it. That said, I think Mission Control's interest in Duna has reached a new high after our reports about the anomalies. We may not be heading home to Kerbin for a very long time yet. Additional corruption and/or encryption was present in the logs that follow. We are still attempting, possibly in vain, to recover said data.

I remember seeing it first many years ago when it was first added. Seen it pop up a good two dozen times in the intervening 7 or 8 years. Then again, I used to play KSP at least once a day for years, so it probably is quite rare in reality.

It's time for the crew of the Dunaverse to get back to Duna.

KSD 2031.3 (Kerbday, Octember 28th 1895) - Low Duna Orbit Jeb made the executive decision to fly light up to orbit, dock with the trans-Ike fuel ferry, and rob it of all of its remaining fuel to ensure our safe return to Duna orbit. He then performed what was probably the most impressive aerocapture I've ever witnessed; we needed less than 200m/s to go from Ike escape trajectory to intercept and full rendezvous with the station. Jeb really does know what he's doing! We got safely back to the Dunaverse, and refueled for our return trip back to the surface. Jeb is doing this against Mission Control's orders, naturally. They had told us to stay up at the Dunaverse for the time being, as fuel supplies are now low enough that Contingency 31 won't be possible if we use any more fuel. Jeb is confident that the mining system on Ike will work perfectly, however, and has made the decision to act as though it will. That said, he only filled the fuel tank on the lander up to 75% capacity. I think even Jeb has his doubts at this point. KSD 2031.4 (Kerbday, Octember 28th 1895) - Duna's Surface Landing was a little bumpy, we got caught in a storm that blew us off course during the parachute-assisted part of the landing and ended up about 3km away from the base. Luckily Contingency 77 was there to save the day: if you can't get back to base, base can get back to you! The storm had cracked one of the solar panels on the base, though, so I had to fix that. We still have plenty of repair kits, but it worries me when things like that happen. I'm seriously considering moving one of the RTGs off the lander and onto the base if that happens again. As expected, Mission Control and Jeb had another shouting match. This time, at least, Jonbert didn't freak out so badly about it. We had a lovely discussion about the Ike trip instead, and about how well everything went. The miner's reported that it's already converted over a hundred liters' worth of fuel from the strata, which is pretty promising given that it's only been a day. We're shy about a thousand liters, so that could well be enough to put Contingency 31 back on track. That is, of course, assuming that Jeb can restrain himself from doing another unscheduled flight. Granted, Ike was a necessary trip, but it doesn't change the fact that our fuel margins are uncomfortably slim. I just got word from Jeb: Mission Control has grounded us for the foreseeable future to prevent further fuel misuse. They sent a remote command to the lander to not accept any inputs from us, so it's basically just spare living accommodations at the moment. To say that Jeb is cross about this would be an understatement, especially after Gene's previous reassurances about Jeb's ability to call our mission parameters. Val somehow talked him down from using the entire base as a rover to explore Duna's surface in protest, but I wouldn't be surprised if he rescinds his promise to her later. I just hope he doesn't get us all killed in the process of proving that he's the one in charge here... Some of the data and mission reports for the next part of the mission turned out to be corrupted. Work is currently underway to undo this corruption, or at least to supplement it with post-mission debriefs.

So you could say you're taking a poll about Pol? Pol is great. So much easier to mine on than Bop, and way more interesting to look at too. Here's to the nifty pollen-shaped space rock and all its bounty!

Today I took a break from KSP to do some other things. Don't want to burn out on the game. Again.

That's pretty normal for most players who haven't gotten the technique down pat, and believe it or not, even veteran players still run into one or both issues from time to time! The tipping over is because your rocket is too tall relative to its landing base. You either need a wider lander, a shorter lander, wider landing leg base, or a suitably overpowered reaction wheel. Also, try not to land on steep slopes; anything over 15 degrees is asking for trouble with most craft! As for the fuel issue, packing enough is essential (the generally accepted goal is a minimum of 640dV down and 640dV back up for a total of 1280dV for an orbit-to-surface-to-orbit round trip; you'll need another 300dV for a return to Kerbin in the same craft). So is technique: get the periapsis just below about 6KM over your target area, and focus on eliminating horizontal speed first! The closer you are to the surface when you begin your descent, the less extra fuel you need to get there. You'll get there. Even Scott Manley's first Mun landing attempts ended in catastrophe, and he's an astrophysicist. If the so many of us now can do better than he did back then, you can too!