Terwin

If you are trying to maximize dv should you not have burned off the heavier LFO fuel first?(ie use up your oxidizer in your kerbodynes as part of the ejection burn then go with the more efficient nuclear engines after burning off the relatively heavier fuel)

I can verify this, I have a Duna mission about 3 days from LKO and the only ladders are the ones that are integral to the parts. You can accelerate slightly faster than Duna gravity with a jet pack, so I just jump towards my port and use the jet pack to maintain speed/manuver, very similar to how I re-enter the cockpit on the Mun(on Minmus I don't jump as that sends me too high too fast) As far as what I forget: lights, especially landing lights. This is why I like the Engine lighting mod, it makes my engine plume give off light, letting me see my night time landing zones even when I forget lights.

Almost exclusively career. Tried the other two a little and I just like career more. Especially with USI-LS and other interesting kerbaly mods...

I think it is just a problem of visibility. The audience for KSP is still growing, so when you see more comments about something than you have seen before it is natural to think that a higher percentage of the forum goers are commenting on it and as such they are up in arms about it, when in reality it could easily be a smaller percentage of forum goers, but a higher number because of the growing fan-base. You never see the larger number of players who quietly support Squad, just the few commenters who raise their voice in protest. I would not start to worry unless and until Squad starts talking about their next project, whatever that may happen to be, as that could be an indicator that sales are dropping off and they need to start putting effort elsewhere.

Did you include surface samples? Are you aware that you can get 'splashed down' in any biome that borders water? (including Kerbin Highlands and badlands) It does not look like you included asteroids.(you can sample each asteroid in each biome, so it should probably be listed as +X/asteroid as asteroids are procedural and you can have an arbitrary number of them) In any case, it is good to have a general idea of how much science is available for games where the player wants reduced science returns, no lab usage, and to still complete the science tree.

Sure, just manually place the parts instead of using radial symmetry. This only applies when placing parts with symmetry, so place them one by one and you can set them however you want.

I am a big fan of the USI-MKS Logistic module. So long as it has access to a sufficient supply of LFO or Kethane(you can choose which to use for a given flight, but I never installed Kethane so I always use LFO) it will autonomously transfer resources between any two vessels in the SOI. I have done plenty of klaw-dockings for rescue 'and their vessel' missions, so I'll just let the 'yet another launch, dock, transfer, reentry' happen in the background In the Kerbin system, it takes ~ 7 hours for a transfer between a surface location and an orbital location, with 1 hour for a surface to surface transfer. I like to deploy an automated 'fuel station' with: * a pair of large drills(tweak-scaled to 400% so each one is like 64 drills in one large part) * Lots of fuel capacity(generally used to get them in place) * ISRU * Emergency life support supplies * an appropriate energy source(often a MKS nuclear reactor backing up some 400% scaled gigantors) Works great for easily refueling any ships I have on hand, even lets me refuel interplanetary transits after an initial 800m/s burn(appoaps almost out to the Mun, with a ~8 hour orbit and > 80% of the kerbin escape burn completed. NOTE: if a ship is not in orbit, you cannot refuel it and if you do any burns while waiting for the fuel, the transfer will likely be lost) I also have a Kerbin based refueler with an engineer on board and a lot more capacity(takes a lot of fuel to get all that fuel in to space, but it lets me launch interplanetary missions almost empty, using the core of the launch stage for the first couple km/s of the transit stage and refilling the main stage and ore reserves in orbit without additional manual launches) Previous versions of the fuel stations did not use tweak-scaled drills or solar panels and that meant a whole lot of parts(30+ drills if I remember correctly, I much prefer a couple 400% drills, functionally the same as 64 normal drills each, just harder to cover with fairings and much easier on my CPU) Before the Feb major revision to MKS, I had refuel stations on Ike, Minmus, Mun, and Gilly, with more on the way to Vall and Moho with a self-supporting manned base on Minmus Makes my kerbin-tour tourist/training missions much lighter when I can refuel at the Mun and Minmus without any drills or ISRU

I find that if I edit the persistence file to up the max displayed contracts to a reasonable number(at least a reasonable number for an experienced player), I can steer my space program just fine. When the list of available contracts is 30-50 long, it becomes much easier to ignore those contracts that do not fit in with your current plans, and there is much less need to discard contracts that are not currently of interest or that seem tedious. Would be nice if this became an in-game editable setting, but I can understand how that could be difficult with the interdependence on the max counts of each contract type

Generally I start a new career with each new version, although I may return to an old career once my preferred mods are updated. My last abandoned career was abandoned because a mod updated and all my interplanetary ships and bases/fuel depots vanished due to missing parts. Before that I stopped my game because I had visited Gilly, Moho, Duna, Ike, Dres, Val, bop, pol, and Eeloo(most with the same ship), and wanted to start over without using Atomic Age or Near Future engines to repeat the process(possibly visiting Lathe, Tylo, and even Eve). I also decided to start using a life support mod to make the challenge more interesting. Not sure if I will come back to my current game or start a new one after 1.1, probably depends on how far I get before my preferred mods get updated(scansat, UKS-LS, UKS-MKS, tweakscale, and KER round out my 'I'm only half playing without these' mods)

I have found that when on one of the Minmus flats that my solar panels will ignore Minmus for the purpose of solar power. This is not always the case for higher altitudes, but on the flats I have not lost the sun except during the rare eclipse. (it also worked for a base at the north pole, but that is probably because I had 400% sized solar panels sticking up and the sun only barely went below the horizon, so I deem it fairly realistic in that case)

I prefer to use the Scansat mod as it gives a nice interface to examine your map in details. note: you need the orbital scanner(M500) to see the average ore in each biome, then you can use a surface scanner to scan once in each biome to get detailed look at all of the ore on the body.(no need to use rovers unless you are on Minmus where biomes are some times so close together it is easier to just drive there) In any case, after you have done the orbital scan, just visiting the 2-3 highest concentration biomes with the surface scanner(and running the scan), should tell you the highest concentration of ore on that body. Engineers provide a boost in drilling from 5x(0 stars) to 25x(5 stars) http://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/wiki/Engineer I have found that with a 3 star engineer and 7-8 drills at a location with 5%+ will usually keep the ISRU busy with a trickle of extra ore. One large extendable heat-sink will happily keep quite a few drills cool (I think it is ~15 heat/drill and 30 or 60 heat/ISRU and the large radiator cools 1000 heat) I will generally use a Tweak-scaled Nuclear engine (2.5m identical to ~ 5.5 un-tweaked nuke engines) a tweak Scaled Drill(200% size is functionally identical to 8 100% pieces), and ISRU, and one large radiator to cool them(I don't use both at once so no reason not to share) This lets me wander back and forth between Mun, Minmus and Kerbol orbit, with visits to Kerbin orbit to exchange crew/tourists.

As a non-steam purchaser I believe I am only qualified for a business class ticket. (on the plus side, by the time I can disembark, hopefully several of my preferred mods will be updated) One please.

Scansats en-route for all planets inside Dres orbit with Fuel station Ike on it's way. (hoping to launch at least one more scansat and a fuel base or two tonight)

They announce Experimentals(more or less a closed beta), the Hype-train thread gets started and we wait for a release. We do not know which day it will be released until the release has happened, but we can be confident that it is still some days(probably weeks) away as Experimentals have not started yet. I am rather expecting 1.1 to be released just after I have my interplanetary fuel network set up and I have a grand tour vessel en route to Jool.

I suppose we will need to agree to disagree then, as I get plenty of grinding at my normal job and would rather stick with interesting challenges in my leisure time. (quietly sweeps current 'training' mission (that visited every unvisited biome on both the Mun and Minmus to collect science) under a rug) That is one of the reasons I have a UKS logistics hub 3 km from the KSC hooked up to a huge fuel reserve and a mining/refining apparatus: no need to send refuel missions inside the Kerbin SOI. (versions with smaller fuel reserves will shortly be launched towards the Mun, Minmus, Gilly, Ike, and Vall)

Same reason you play career mode I would imagine, they want to maximize their fun/play-time ratio. Something to consider: Once you have the MPL unlocked, you can access the entire science tree without ever leaving the KSC again. Just build a MPL into a 'hopper' that can hover on (jet) engines long enough to convert experiments into data, load it up with KSC data, lift off to process as needed and take it back to the runway/launch pad to recover it when it can no longer generate more science. Recover for 100%(minus trivial amounts of fuel), and repeat. Yes, I have performed experiments splashed down in the badlands after flying half way around Kerbin(it was part of my Caveman game), but now that I have done it once, I no longer find it an interesting challenge. I will admit that before I launch a ship with a lab on board, I always perform and collect the launch-pad experiments(to be loaded later) and then perform and convert all available experiments both flying low and flying high, but that is mostly to give my scientists something to chew on while I travel to my destination.(currently my first lab-ship is preparing for a final landing on the Mun to re-fuel before heading to Minmus, having already visited every Mun biome for which I had not yet collected surface samples, then rescuing a Kerbal and his command pod from a wonky orbit of the Mun). I like to think that the tourists who are paying for the expedition are getting their money's worth, especially as there will be a free trip to the Kerbol SOI... (I just hope I don't run low on rations before I get back to Kerbin, or else I may lose my 5 star rating as a tourist attraction. Had to spend a lot more time than planned harvesting fuel because I was at less than 100m/s d-v when I landed in a ore-poor area of the Mun )

Looking at the Science Wiki, there should only be 2 groups that can top 500 science in one experiment in the stock game: 1) Asteroid samples(70 data) from outside the orbit of Dres(Jool system(up to 700 data from flying low on Lathe) or Eeloo(up to 1050 data landed)) 2) Surface samples(40 data) from Eeloo(600 data) While it would be nice if there was an answer to this issue, I must admit that I have difficulty imagining a space program that can get Kerbals to Eeloo(for surface samples) or asteroids to Jool/Eeloo with a Kerbal on hand to take samples, that has not already finished just about any tech tree they might like to use... (I am sure a tech tree could be assembled that requires every last bit of data that could be harvested in the Kerbol system Plus a hefty dose from labs, but even then, just topping off your lab from the Kerbin system before you head out to Jool/Eeloo could net you at least as much during your trip as those experiments would add once you got here...) It sounds like the ability to use a lab as a storage depot for multiple copies of experiments(like 4x goo, materials and surface samples from each biome) will remain intact, and may become even more valuble as you will want an extra copy or two of each experiment for converting to lab data as well. Although that does remind me, last time I used the science->rep strategy, I could recover lots and lots of science but my rep never moved. I even checked my total rep points by saving and spending lots of rep on other strategies, and the total number of points did not go up. (I think this was 1.0.3) Anyone know if this is working in stock 1.0.5?(I had several mods so it may or may not have been working in stock at that point)

Probably my outer planets grand tour. Admittedly I used a VASMIR engine from the Near Future mod, refueled with ISRU, but I landed on every body on rails outside of Kerbin orbit except for: Jool, Tylo, Lathe. (I am currently working on doing the set-up for something similar using stock engines(with tweak-scale for part-count management), and Life Support. I have already started launching scansats and intend to send out fuel depots with Life support supply stashes shortly)

At the very least I would expect it to let me keep my proof-of concept outposts closer to the space center. Currently I deploy everything 3km+ from the space center to limit the impact on launches. I would expect that necessity to go away with multi-core physics

Perhaps because NASA is playing in hard-core mode with low financial rewards, extensive government oversight, no private contracts for income, RSS distances, a very unforgiving LS mod, Dangit!, radiation hazards, NIMBY, no game loads or reverts, luddites and a d/v to orbit around 8km/s. Heck, they don't even have a lunch site on the equator.

Actually, the save games are all .xml files with nothing directly related to the back-end in them. Aside from functionality tweaks that could affect in-progress missions, I would not expect any problems with carrying over a stock save game from 1.0.5 to 1.1. On the other hand, I use a number of Mods and would not expect a seamless transition if only because my mods will require time to get updated. The 'knobs and buttons' for KSP mostly revolve around part-count and mods. I am confident that if you have an unmodded game and restrict yourself to 30-50 parts in the Kerbol system(including debris), I am confident that you can maintain the highest available FPS. (much like you almost never see more than 30-50 active units/objects(independent objects that can each be hit, hit back, blow up, etc) in any other game all on the screen at the same time, and if you see 200+ active and independent units on the screen at once you will generally get lag much like you do for 200+ piece craft in KSP. It is just that you have the freedom to have 200+ part craft in KSP while most other games will never permit that to happen) Personally, I like the available mods, but I recognize that this means there will occasionally be problems that need to be addressed, and even save-game breakages (ckan downloaded an update to UKS-LS before I realized it would remove all my bases and interplanetary vessels for example), but that is just the price you pay for taking a pretty awesome base-game and making it even better.

I must admit that I am vaguely amused by the thought of mods that add spikes to your rover tires, or 'spin-out plumes' if you turn off traction-control. Of course that also gives me images of kerbals bracing a rover against their Minmus base, and trying to fill an over-sized bowl with minus-shavings by making the rover peel-out. (and then a circle of crest-fallen kerbals sitting in a a hitch-hiker module around this giant bowl, poking at it with spoons with one of them saying 'But I really thought it would taste like mint ice cream!')

As far as I can tell, they expect career to be played in several different ways, and they want all of them to be viable approaches. All of these 'let the player choose what missions are available' requests are failing to notice that the player already decides which missions they want to take. Perhaps it would be nie to have more missions available, but you still decide what you want to do. Also, giving the player more knobs to twiddle only increases the already steep learning curve for this game, making it harder for new players(the ones still giving Squad money). Currently, the world firsts pay-outs can fund a reasonably frugal space program without taking any contracts. (or, for a more experienced player, a not so frugal space program) If you make mistakes, want to go faster, or just want bigger rockets, you can take any of the available contracts to help fund your activities. Personally, my only objection to the contract system is that there are not enough contracts available at the same time, so I upped my max available contracts to 30 and I always seem to have multiple contracts that I am interested in pursuing. (although now that I have ~20M funds, automated mining depots on route or arrived at every planet except Dres and Eeloo, with manned missions en route to Duna and Jool, I am more inclined to just let some time pass and get that interplanetary fueling network set up, might even send out additional UKS modules to get life support production going everywhere too... Remember: the contract system needs to support as many styles of play as practical, so it will not be optimal for any of them. This comes with KSP being a sandbox game.

When landing, large craters are often pretty flat in the middle of the crater. Minmus I generally land on one of the Flats(greater/great/lesser) (it is hard to find something quite as flat as those areas) Aside from Minmus, I watch the slope read-out on KER(only available under 10km). As I usually come to a near-stop over airless bodies(surface relative), then descend, I'll leave about 20m/s on the horozontal until I can see the slope read-out. Once I am over a slope that is flat enough for the current vessel, I'll burn retrograde instead of radial(or I'll burn on the far side of retrograde from Radial if I am not currently trying to slow my descent, or it is particularly problematic to find a landing spot). I try to keep my landers such that they can handle 10-12 degrees(often through clipping). any more than that, and even if you could land, you will generally slide(landed a fuel depot on a ~25 degree slope on Gilly and the sliding did not slow down on its own until the slope got under 12 degrees, finally stopping in a 9 degree area)

The 'tab per body' is probably the most workable system I have seen thus far. Perhaps starting with one or two 'fly by' and 'explore' types, then offering more contracts once those are done One thing that people keep forgetting when they ask for a coherent contract system is that KSP is, at it's heart, a sandbox game. If you had exactly the same game, but the contract system was a linear set of contracts that never varied, you would have greatly reduced replayability, and anyone who had come to the end of the pre-planned contract list would have reason to consider their game 'finished' and would be more inclined to move to other games. If you want coherent contracts, you have the 'World Firsts', if you want 'I run my program my way' then you have the world firsts and any contracts that happen to fit into your pre-planned mission for your funding. If you want a game with incredible replayability, you need significant random elements in the game. There is nothing random about the rocket science or flying a well designed rocket. It would be incredibly difficult to have a balanced random science system(either a random science tree or random science acquisition). That leaves Funds as something significant to which they can add an element of randomness. While the starting funding as well as significant mile-stones can and are rewarded(see World Firsts), everything else is random, but in a more or less believable way. I think tourist contracts are very realistic, including the ones where they make unreasonable demands for what they are willing to pay. It would be nice if we could make counter-offers(I'll take you to Minmus, Duna and Lathe, but not landed at Eve), or offer to only take part of a group of tourists(I'd be happy to take the 5 of you to the Mun, Minmus, and Kerbol orbit, but I'm not taking that other guy to Tylo), but I would not expect them to be accepted 100% of the time. I also think the Explore contracts are a nice supplement to the World firsts(not to mention good hints for what to do next for newer players). Kerbals needing rescues at any body here you have already sent manned missions seems perfectly reasonable as well(even if the 'craft' are a little silly, at least they have a low part-count and are believably 'stranded'). Some of the more involved methods mentioned above(setting up preferred contract types, preferred destinations, etc) are adding a lot of complexity to a game that already has a steep learning curve. Raising the bar for new players is against the best interests of both Squad and the community, so if you want such added complexity, use mods as it would be a bad idea to add it to stock unless it was behind a switch that defaulted to off (at which point it is almost a mod anyway). I think the current plan to 'lean towards the types that the player is already accepting' is a good idea to reduce the number of waiting contracts that the player does not care about without adding more complexity to the player's side of the game. Something that I found helped greatly, especially later in the game when I was looking to expand my operations, was to go into the persistence file and increase the max number of contracts being offered. I actually think it would be a very good idea for squad to start with perhaps a slightly more limited number of contracts available at first (sort of like you only have 2 to choose from at the beginning, but obviously more than that) and then increase the number available as you upgrade Mission control(ending with 20+ at the highest tier) to support launching multiple interplanetary missions while still having things to do around Kerbin while they transit. This way you start out simple, but you end up with lots of choices when you have the capability to handle several complicated missions at once.