Flayer

Do people just have super high expectations? So much complaining in this thread, sheez. I just bought the expansion for 15 dollars because I saw they were going to add some things to it and don't wanna miss out on that action. I can deal with a little delay though. I've spent like 3k hours playing this damn game, it's about time I throw some more cash at them. I should probably donate to some modders too if I had any sense. Yeah, 1.4.2 was buggy for me. I skipped 1.3 cause of KSP-fatigue and some mods weren't being updated or had some other issues. I'd also skipped one version or another because my OS was using some old libraries and I couldn't be arsed to update. That's just always been Kerbal, sometimes it's on them and sometimes it's on me. I don't know why some people think it's any different now then it was in the past. It's certainly not the end of the world in any case since I could always just use one of the other versions that work fine (like the one I paid for so long ago). It's crazy to think you should expect everything to always work for you for the tiny investment you made. I'm sure they'd gladly give you your money back if you just recently bought it and found out it doesn't work for you and you wanted to return it rather than wait for a fix. In fact I think that's Steam policy.

If I recall correctly, Musk did not exactly say the time line was set in stone. In fact I believe the words he used were "fuzzy timeline". But he intends to start sending some Dragons to Mars from 2018 on out, so if the government want to start building the first base, they can. Maybe send an orbital station first, then go from there. After the soil sample retrieval mission in 2022, you send the Orbital Station in 2024 -> orbital return vehicle in 2026 -> landing + lift-off vehicle in 2028 -> ground base equipment in 2030 -> and finally the first crew in 2032. And yeah, I'm pulling this out of my behind, but you know, what's to stop us from changing the plans that are currently on the table if new technologies do prove themselves over the next few years? From there on out it would be relatively easy to find more people willing to invest. I'd focus on mining and construction first (next to propellant production, I guess). And don't talk to me about not knowing how to survive on Mars. "Ooohh, the life support designed for the ISS wont work with gravity" We know how to make stuff work in gravity, we're quite used to it. Maybe some of the dragon missions can send some robotic equipment to see if the Martian soil can be used to grow plants if you add some X Y or Z chemicals. If not just raw out there in the atmosphere, then in a greenhouse. I know it's not going to be easy per say, but I really have to counter the pessimism in this thread or I fear it might swallow up the whole of Earth.

~2030: NASA plants research base on the back of the Falcon Heavy X. Interest in spaceflight grows, and funding/subsidies increase a little to help develop new technologies to be used on the base (agriculture, 3d printing of replacement parts, etc). The same technologies can be used on Earth. Solar power, food for Africa and the Middle East, etc. ~2040: ITS booster is done. Mining company signs a contract with the government to begin small scale mining operations on Mars. Government will buy the first resources extracted to use in the advanced 3D printers developed earlier to expand their own base. ~2050: Construction companies are hired by a bunch of rich people who want to do their own projects on Mars to make money later. They use the resources extracted by one of the now two mining companies that have medium-sized operations on Mars. More expansion. ~2060: People move over their families, buy products from rich guys that own factories on Mars, eat pizza, find spouses at work, have babies. This is happening people, better get used to it.

So that's it according to you? We don't have the tools now, so just throw in the towel and why bother? What kind of an attitude is that, sheez. Once it becomes cheaper to get there, more people will work towards making use of that reduced cost... and there's already a ton of organizations around who are making tiny little babysteps... And a few big striders like SpaceX. You can't see this general industry growing slightly once the cost to get there has been cut in half? And then this trend continues over time? I can understand your scepticism towards the medical stuff, but I really don't see that being an actual problem. Sure, the kids may have slightly less dense bones, but who cares you don't need em, you're a Martian, born and raised. Have you seen the kind of weird shapes humans can exist in here on Earth? If we can keep Hawking alive for all this time, getting pregnant and giving birth on Mars is not going to be a problem.

But.. have you never heard of opening up new markets? The simplest concept in starting a business and you just completely ignore it.

This is provided that the government research base is already there. What other qualifier would there need to be? If its cheap enough to get there, it will be cheap enough to send bigger hab modules, mining equipment, a canteena, etc. All that stuff will come quite easily, I imagine. Once its cheap enough... You're such a bunch of pessimists just because there's a ton of work still to do. You can throw numbers at me, but that doesn't take away from what we've all seen happen in the past 15 years. The fact that we've got a very dedicated bunch of girls and guys who managed to go from nothing to launching and landing the falcon 9 rocket. I'm confident they'll build the big booster provided they can sustain the company for another 30 years, and -- forget the silly spaceship on top -- you can just use it to send tons of cargo to Mars one-way and use it to build the necessary facilities at a fraction of the cost of the research base. I mean, other than the risk of some catastrophic failure in attempting to get the booster done, I don't see anything holding us back. And I've gone through large parts of this thread and read the criticisms, risk assessments, and all those silly little numbers that people keep bringing up all over this forum. I can barely do high school math, but seeing SpaceX do its thing, I know that 15 years + 30 years = huge booster to bring stuff into space for almost naught compared to what it costs now. The thing landed on a barge in the ocean after bringing something to orbit. This is freaking huge. Let me ask you: when will you start believing? Will you start believing it is a possibility once SpaceX relaunches a Falcon 9? Will you start believing when the Falcon Heavy X is done and has been used to retrieve a soil sample from Mars with the new Dragon spacecraft? Perhaps when the research base has been built? When the first mining equipment sponsored by a corporation arrives? When the first tourists arrive on the base? Or how about when they do finally have a booster the size of that which was presented last September? At which point will you finally choose to say "Wow, it can be done." I'm not a religious person, but this is something I can put my faith in.

If its cheap enough to get there it will make perfect sense. Enter Musk. Thank you thread over.

What on Earth do you mean by "no justification for colonizing Mars"? As long as people will continue to want to expand their knowledge and understanding of the universe, as long as people want to push the edge and so forth, we will get there eventually. There is no need for any further justification beyond that. At least, not for me personally, and I can only assume there are millions of people like me in that regard (even if you might not be one of them). Worrying about investments just seems silly unless you're actively engaged in that field (eg. the MSE that was founded in 2098). If there's a will, people are going to acquire the funds necessary to pay for the way. We will be on Mars before the century is over. And - eventually - we will make love there. And there will be Martians. And this trend will continue across our solar system and beyond. It might take centuries for all of this to come to fruition, but dear god "no justification" is just the weakest excuse I've ever seen. We exist. Mars exists. That's all the justification necessary for us to get there. People are working on at least one of these things: there's an oxygen generator on the 2020 rover to Mars. There's probably other research and development being done as well, we just might not be aware of it.

It just baffles me that there are people on this forum arguing - more or less - against the colonization of Mars. Isn't it obvious that's what we have to do to start on our quest of loveing our way through the galaxy?

I check the amount of parts I have and skip that many hours ahead before I launch. That's not desperate, is it?

Oh thanks, I probably should have looked for myself since last time I hunted for one was over a year ago, my bad.

Any plans to make EVA utilize a limited amount of fuel available in the command pod, or alternatively having an option to disable the automatic EVA refuel?

I've skipped over 1.1 because of some pulseaudio issue that seems to have been resolved in 1.2 (and because I needed a break from KSP anyhow), and now I'm back for some more rocketry. I'm getting to know the absolute rear-end load of changes to the stock game over these past two versions while I'm waiting for KCT and CLS to get updated. I think those are the only core mods that I need that haven't been updated yet. Especially now that apparently RemoteTech functionality has been so elegantly included in the stock game. I have to get to know all the new parts as well. If I have any complaint, it is that there's been so many changes I don't even have time to complain to modders about updating their mods.

I don't timewarp huge distances at a time because I am very bad at having my satellite networks aligned probably and i end up having to stop to rewind them. also life support makes it hard at times.

So, how much closer is this going to bring us to start mining these things? I can already imagine that 20-30 years from now we'll send up some basic mining equipment along with a couple of the latest 2040-style 3d printers and get building on that first (robotic?) asteroid colony in the first capitalist venture outside of the Earth SOI