MaverickSawyer

With the imminent arrival of KSP2, I think it's time to reflect on the fun, shenanigans, headaches, and adventures we've all had along the way... My first interaction with KSP was actually before it was even really public. I remember back in, oh, late 2010 or so when HarversteR came onto the Orbiter Forums and started sharing his new project: a funny little spaceflight game where you build your rocket from parts and then fly it. Needless to say, on a forum dedicated to a much more hardcore spaceflight sim, we all viewed it with some curiosity and encouraged him to press on. I looked at it, thought it was kinda eh, and went back to wrestling with my beloved Orbiter. For those who don't know of Orbiter, I can't say I blame you. It's a fairly niche product. Full n-body simulations, fully to scale solar system... and none of the flexibility in designing ships, planes, rockets, etc, that KSP has. It's the passion project of a single man in England, and only gets updated every couple years. (2010 to 2016 was the last update gap that I paid any attention to.) It's a proper simulator, like Microsoft Flight Simulator or Digital Combat Simulator, especially with projects like the aforementioned XR family or the G42-200. But, I finally dipped my toes into the KSP party in December 2011, with (I believe) V0.12 being my introduction. I downloaded it onto a flash drive and played it on the computers at college instead of doing homework. (And yes, it was small enough to do that kind of stuff back then.) Those early days where we had only the sandbox, Kerbin, the Mun, and the Three Brothers. No tutorials, no fancy plugins, not even multiple flights at once. Lessons learned from hard experience were shared in the forums, and were taken to heart. Some, like how to properly escape the soup of an atmosphere we had back then, have largely fallen to the wayside as irrelevant. Others, like the rule of thumb for flying to the Mun ("The Munway opens at Munrise"), still hold true to this day, and I occasionally lean on them, even in the days of MechJeb, maneuver nodes, etc. Something to be said for that kind of simple, seat of the pressure suit flying, ya know? And then 0.14 hit. And hoo boy, what a difference. Multiple flights at once, and all new Kerbals! Persistence! We could do rendezvous missions, but that was about it. No docking, no EVA. But hey, you could land on the Mun next to the ship you crashed. That's a rescue, right? Plugins became a thing. First iterations of autopilots like MechJeb cropped up, as well as ones long since forgotten. (Anyone remember Lazor Guidance? ) I definitely remember an early plugin for hunting monoliths and such... an AWACS rotodome with a two-color light to tell you if you were travelling towards and anomaly, or away. Simple, but effective. And the parts packs mods back then... I think the legacy of only a few live on. C7 plane parts started out as a mod before they rolled them into the stock game, iirc, and Firespitter still lives on in a much updated form, but beyond that... things like NovaPunch, one of the classic packs back then? Gone. I don't know if many of those early mods and plugins survive anywhere anymore, as we shared them on the forums directly back then. No SpaceDock or CurseForge or CKAN available. And after The Great Forum Derp of 2012... well, lots of that stuff got lost. After that, things seem to kinda blur together. EVAs, the rest of the Kerbol system, docking, tutorials, rovers, probes, electricity, communications, asteroids, ion engines, Science, career mode, banishment of the soup atmosphere... Everything came together to make the core of the game we came to know and love. And then, the much awaited V1.0 hit. Much celebration from the community. We got ISRU, reentry heating, all new Kerbals (again!), fairings, and a whole lot of fun. (Especially with ISRU. You didn't need to get a mod to refuel your Jool 5 mission anymore!) It was a glorious time. The community was going full tilt. Challenges, missions and exploits being shared, cooperative saves... All of that had been present before, but now it took on a whole new level of energy. Which was good, as the pace of updates slowed down moving on from 1.0. Less tinkering with core mechanics at a rapid pace, and more methodical, well tested updates. New parts, new capabilities, new functions, all introduced with great success and much appreciation from the community. Parachutes for Kerbals? I can't imagine KSP without those personal 'chutes anymore, tbh. literally game changing. EVA Construction? Definitely a case of the community inspiring the devs to make their own version. (KAS/KIS is a staple of mine ever since it got introduced, and it actually pairs quite well with the stock version.) Fireworks? Oh, man. Not gonna lie, I made a few attempts at Orion drives with them and holy cow was that fun while it lasted. Robotics? Another community inspiration, and I'd almost argue better than the mod that inspired it. I certainly have made good use of the robotics on many an occasion. Through all of this, though, the community has been the heart and soul of the game. Between the diversity of mods available, the challenges we pose to each other, the missions we share to inspire others, and the help we give to those who are staring at a learning curve that seems insurmountable... We're always there for each other. And I can't thank all of you enough for that. Now, as we prepare for the arrival of the successor to our beloved booster burning, Jeb launching, Kraken summoning game, I ask all of you... what are your favorite memories from the OG KSP?

Jesus, talk about a blast from the past. This is all old-hat stuff for me now.

The Normal/Antinormal orientation might be worth a try, see how well MJ handles it. Definitely would give me another data set to work off of. I've shut off all but one really throttled back reaction wheel, and it still seems to start the whipping action. I don't use RCS aside from the docking phase, and actually use KIS to remove any RCS thruster blocks after it's emplaced. The Torque PIDs is really what I was hoping to tinker with. Make it less... twitchy... in that particular situation. Failing that, I might just have to go for the kOS, which I've never really tinkered with.

Question for the more experienced users here... I'm building an ISS replica, and I've been trying to use MechJeb to maintain orientation. However, once it gets close to the target orientation (Usually prograde, 0* roll), it'll go into a feedback loop and start whipping the station up and down along the pitch axis, imparting increasingly large bending loads. It's gotten progressively worse as I've been adding modules, and after adding the Destiny module, it's getting bad enough I'm worried it'll snap connections, even with Autostrut to Grandparent enabled on everything. Adding to my confusion, using the stock SAS in prograde doesn't initiate this bending action. (It does initiate a roll oscillation, but that's a different problem. entirely ) Has anyone encountered this before? And if so, how did you combat it?

Okay. Just trying to run down a cause for the game crashing after leaving the build area. Wanted to rule out some of the more unlikely possibilities first.

Does this have any conflicts with Smokescreen and/or RealPlume?

EDIT: I'm a derp. Made a simple mistake regarding how something worked. Please disregard.

You need to have a rare/hidden emote for the Kerbals when on EVA when your computer detects it's Friday now.

Wait, found the problem. Remember how I said I grabbed the file off of Github? The .dll file isn't in the download from the master branch, for whatever reason. EDIT: Hell, the entire Plugins folder was missing from that. Huh.

You want all 8.89MB of the file? or is there some part in particular I can track down in it and provide?

It was installed by hand. I've never used CKAN. As for knowing how the game sees it... I got the AVC prompt after I installed it, so the game is at least recognizing its presence. As for logs... Literally just went through it and found that it's looking for ClickThroughBlocker 1.0.0, which is not what was available for download... [WRN 22:12:28.054] AssemblyLoader: Assembly 'RCSBuildAid' has not met dependency 'ClickThroughBlocker' V1.0.0 Current available version is 0.1.9.5. https://github.com/linuxgurugamer/ClickThroughBlocker/releases

Yes, I did. Grabbed both of them from GitHub to make sure they're up to date. Completely removed RCSBuildAid and the dependencies and reinstalled them fresh to make sure it was done correctly. The game is seeing them... It's just not displaying the buttons for them. This is in KSP 1.9.1, btw. Maybe it's not forward compatible?

Can confirm that RCSBuildAid, in the latest version uploaded to SpaceDock, with the latest versions of both dependencies, is not appearing in the build window. It's definitely loading, though, as it asked me if I wanted to let the integrated Mini AVC check for updates.

Grabbed this at work on Thursday night with my new camera...

Are you retracting the ring on the active unit? Or are you using two active/two passive units, instead of the proper mix of one of each?

Can confirm the presence of the phantom forces on the lander pod. Heck, most of the BDB ladders seem to have this issue. Not sure what causes it.

Some screenshots of BDB-centric vehicles in action...

Any other field reports about what works and what doesn't?

Just as an FYI, the newest antennas added in the last major update are NOT RT compatible at present.

I have to admit, my initial reaction was one of dismay. After all, there's still so much that can be done with the current game. Then I watched both of the videos, and realized that my dismay was completely unfounded. KSP2 has already demonstrated a deep respect for its predecessor, and keeps the spirit of the original alive, and even improves on it. I did wince a bit at that price tag, but... given how much fun I got out of the US$10 I paid for KSP almost 8 years ago, I'm absolutely willing to cough up 6 times that for a new, improved, and absolutely exciting version. ALL ABOARD THE HYPE ORION!!!!

Got a job offer from Textron Aviation to be a mechanic in their Wichita, KS maintenance facility, and after a brief review of the benefits, gladly accepted it.

Proud to announce that i have graduated from South Seattle College as of June 14th with an Associates of Applied Science in Aeronautical Technology, and completed my combined Airframe and Powerplant Mechanic license on May 28th.

I visited Ames many years ago, and seem to recall it being a scale model for the subsonic wind tunnel they operate there.

I've noticed a significant drop in game performance with the update, compared to stock 1.6.1... maybe that's causing your computer to work harder?

Okay, anyone else having trouble finding the surface science objects on Kerbin? Just did a decently fast swing around the mountains to the west, and no sign of either of the two objects.