GarrisonChisholm

10 Minutes earlier... Colonel Jorfen's office... Jorfen paced up and down, his patience long gone and his voice rising in timbre and tone. "You can't endorse the Civil Authoritiy's response! We've been through this, their way will only lead to us not being prepared in time! And YOU are forgetting everything that is at stake." "No Jorfen, its you that is forgetting what is at stake," spoke her cool cold voice. "Our Civil Liberties, our faith in Freedom, and our dismissal of the thousands of years of autocracy you represent. I was entrusted as the Space Program's Civil Authority, and thanks to the revelation that there is a real, desperate need to know what is Out there, we will no longer have to worry about funding or motivation. Kerbin's future in space is assured, and your foolhardy and vastly more expensive plan is only destined for ruin-" "Listen-" "And, Jorfen, you no longer hold anything over me. ...I'm having my 'taxes' done by an expert now. ...You have played your last card. Goodbye Jorfen." Click. Jorfen pulled the phone away from his face and stared at it, then looked at the two guests. The second D-Magic Rep stood behind the chair which held the first, with his hands folded behind his back. The first D-Magic Rep sat with an open briefcase on his lap, staring at Jorfen. They both wore sunglasses. The first closed the brief-case. "I think that settles things Jorfen. You are no longer of any use to us." First and Second regarded Jorfen indifferently for the briefest moment, then just as Jorfen drew a breath to speak they deliberately turned and saw themselves out. The click of the door when it closed seemed to Jorfen to echo like the sharpest report. He stared at the door, then absently turned to gaze out his window, across the tarmac to the hangar where their huge space-plane that had never made it to space would soon be stripped for scrap. The thousands of men at his command would soon be transferred to other jobs, the lucky ones landing at KSC. Jorfen gritted his teeth. He sat down at his desk, and opened his laptop. Several swift keystrokes and the screen was where he needed it to be. With a sly smile he picked up his phone. ... Mort sat in his office, looking at the projections his staffers had done about the increasing revenues the Program would receive. It wasn't the money that Mort cared about, it was the margins, and they were delightful. His phone rang. Reaching for it, he almost answered it without noticing who was calling- but he did. He raised an eyebrow, and answered. "Mortimer." "Mort, my dear, dear friend. How are you today?" Mort could hear the smile in his voice, but furthermore he could tell it was genuine, and that more than anything in years caused a small chill of fear to rush up his spine. "...Just fine Jorfen. What about you? You seem pretty chip-" "Oh you've no idea Mortimer." His voice smiled with a wicked warmth. "You've no idea. So, things must look rather fine from your office now eh? Everything is looking rosy?" Mortimer needed to hear no more, and as swiftly as possible while concealing his movement completely he rose and ghosted through the halls. No one in the Admin building had ever seen him move so quickly, but with the grace which accompanied those movements he was downright frightening. "Things are just fine Jorfen, as you probably know." He would have added 'now that we're going to be getting your space budget', but something told him that he had already said too much with his first reply. "Oh, yes, I know very well Jorfen." The sick smile invaded Mortimer's very soul, the smile of a cornered animal that realized it had nothing to lose. In the time it took to speak these sentences he had reached the parking garage. He muted his phone as he kicked his Kerbaratti to life and left a cloud of tire smoke as he accelerated to 100 by the time he'd climbed a single level and cornered the street. The guards stood slack-jawed in awe at the spectacle. Mort opened it up, dashing flat out for the Air Force base that on a good day was 45 minutes away. Jorfen began to type a single word into his computer, with slow, delicious deliberation. ...K... "What do you think you'll do with all that money Mort? All that delicious Funding." ...E... Mort triggered noise canceling to obscure the wind and engine howl. "I am sure the PCA will give a fine direct-" "Oh, yes, Of Course. Madame Program Civil Authority herself. Yes, I'm sure she will." ...R.B... "And what do you think you'll do when her Directives involves probes and satellites which you no longer have contact with Mort?" The sweetness this question was asked with was nauseating. Mort blinked, then re-muted the phone and deftly sent a one-finger text old-style to Linus; SHUT DOWN THE TRACKING STATION NOW He clicked back to Jorfen. ...A.L... "Why would that- how can you think you have a valid motivation for such an act Jorfen? You were lucky to survive the Coup, if you were to do such a thing no-one would forgive you this time." Mort knew that those in the Coup Cabal hated when it was called a "coup" and not a "war", but even this ploy netted him nothing. Jorfen was too far gone to care. "Oh, no doubt you're right Mort." ...I... "They would forgive a private who was just following orders, but I know an officer would have the Holy Book of Jool thrown at him. But then, I have nothing left to lose, do I Mort?" ...S... Mort gritted his teeth, then let his foot off the gas, and slowly began to coast to a stop. He could tell his pursuit was vain. "I know. Because you're in the corner I prepared for you." Jorfen grinned, but with not quite the mirth he had previously had. Mort was right, and he hated knowing that was going to be one of his last thoughts. He opened his drawer, and Mort heard a well known metallic sound. "Enjoy that Mort, whatever it does for you. Cheers." ...M. >bootstring_alphaBlock;standby_Kill;KERBALISM_execute. vzzzzt. ...Mort let the echo of the final round from Jorfen rebound around his mind, and braked the car to a halt. He looked up from the convertible into the sky, wondering what he had done, but knowing it had been catastrophic. Mort sat there, staring at the sky as the sun slowly set, knowing his victory was now a failure.

Notes. Good afternoon everyone. Just dropping a note to my legions of (3) readers to assure you that the tale has not died. The next 3 chapters are written in my head, but having had one disastrous experience with Kerbalism, I did not want to proceed to the climax of the thread without proving to myself that it could be done on Kerbalism. So, I made a sandbox game to sim out some designs. My word what an Odyssey (Bob Fitch reference). After sending the flagship mission on its way, I was rudely interrupted by the entire ship dropping from warp and every part having a danger temp bar over it and then proceeding to explode. Thus began the most laborious, tedious, seldom-rewarding-until-the-epiphany period of troubleshooting I have ever had to undertake. Since I got home from work on 6/29, I have put at least FIFTY hours into the enterprise before finally finding the solution. And man was it hard to find. In short, time warp affects how Kerbalism deals with radiation. Through Warp 5 (x100), Radiation Flux is handled normally. At higher warps it is not, and if you have RTGs on your crewed vessel then the game is constantly applying radiation effects to the crew. After a mere 30-40 days, boom. Having finally figured this out, simply switching to all solar power has done the trick. I am now finally testing a vessel that could do the job. Rest assured, in a day or 3 I will be done, and then the next chapters of the story can be written, for indeed the CA has mandated that Duna be investigated immediately, and in person. Everyone hold your breath!

April 2, '063 "Good morning everyone! As we've all seen over the recent weeks we have finally visited the outer planets!" "The LBL-JIP, launched via Local Body Lifter, is already on track for a close encounter with Tylo in just over a 2 months. Its sister ship, the KOPeC JIP, was the first to arrive at Jool however." "With a burn point close to the Orbit of Laythe, the probe was able to determine from long distance viewing the incredible news that the moon hosts liquid water oceans! This stunning revelation immediately pushed Laythe to the top of Linus' 'quest for life' lists." Gene chuckled and Linus grinned, absent-mindedly rotating his phone in its place on the table before him. "KOPeC-JIP then fired its breaking motors, ultimately dropping into an orbit from which a pair of very valuable encounters could be crafted. We look forward to both of them later this year." "Next, Bhiku entered the Sarnus system, on course for its very swift fly-by of Tekto." "Vast reams of data were collected, which have been beamed back over the last several weeks. On its way out of the system, this beautiful image was captured. Sarnus too truly deserves scientific focus." "Then just a few days ago, Jeb and Bill took up Locostor to deploy a new relay satellite, though its ultimate destination is unknown as of yet." "The Locostor used the new Raptor engines, and reached orbit with no issues, climbing out at a nearly direct 25* ascent." "The Loco-Libra relay satellite is capable of Kerbin System deployment or a direct injection to Duna, and is the 3rd generation of Relay Sat for the KSC." "The Locostor returned directly to KSC after its first flight, providing a highly economical deployment." "We are all very happy with how all these encounters have gone, at Jool, Sarnus, & Duna, and we hope for a..." Gene looked over at Linus, who had just grabbed his phone with both hands, and they all had just enough time to see the color drain from Linus' face before he bolted from the room like a hare startled by a hound.

Without seeing your screen, are you planning your burn on the correct side of Kerbin? Dark side takes you out, light side takes you in.

It is kind-of a shame, but the good news is we are not losing any progress or the main story. I'm also pretty sure that the explanation for what happened will prove to be a good moment for storytelling. :]

Good afternoon everyone (& by that I mean the 3 or 4 folks who follow my tale). As some of you may know I have had an encroaching problem with loading my persistent save rear its ugly head. My game finally refused to load, and 6 days of fiddling and hacking couldn't restore it. Finally I proceeded with my best guess for the fix to the problem. I uninstalled Kerbalism, and indeed the save loaded up- however, every Flight that had a kerbalism part was unloaded. I wasn't sure if they would be restored when I restored Kerbalism, but getting into the game was better than losing it. I deleted about 10 redundant/useless flights, reinstalled Kerbalism and loaded the game. Sure enough I lost a lot I did not intend to, but at least I was in. Long-story-short, removing Kerbalism 'unloaded' everything with a kerbalism part, and the radiation detector science part is one I used a lot. When I restored kerbalism, the lost flights were not restored. I lost about 25 missions I did not plan to lose. I have 1 satellite around Kerbin, 1 around Mun, 2 around Minmus, 1 around Eve, a single seismic sensor on Ike, and 2 relays around Duna (the most recent two from WWYT). I have a relay sat in LKO set for Duna in a year, and the 4 deep space relays still going. That's it. All other landers and relay sats are gone. Flights can go on however, so I am in truth delighted. I will wait a day or two for anyone to respond with an important note ("I really wish you would do xyz, or, "just edit your old save with BLANK and fix it dummy"), and then I will go ahead with the next post- which will include a story explanation for what happened. Thanks for your patience everyone! ... well, that might be ambitious..., thanks for your patience You!

Ok, I have finally corrected my issue, so I thought I'd post the status for anyone who may have wondered. It was indeed a Kerbalism issue. I removed Kerbalism, and the save loaded up- I then deleted about 10 redundant/useless flights, reinstalled Kerbalism and it has loaded up fine and is functional again. I lost a bunch of flights I did not expect to (that had kerbalism parts and did not return when I stripped out the mod), but I am happy to have access again and I think I treat the situation creatively (as far as the 3 or 4 folks who follow my mission reports are concerned). Thanks for everyone who assisted me! For what its worth, I will be replacing my laptop within a few months, just in case the hard drive is indeed about to go. For the amount of time I put into KSP on this laptop I deserve to cut down my wait times anyway. :)

Well, the problem is unsolvable as is, but I have explained it. Before my last play session I had 45 active flights. My Ike lander dropped 2 seismic probes, and my Orbiter dropped 4 landers and 2 relays. This raised my active flights to 53, and it will not load, no matter my connivances. An earlier save with 45 or fewer active flights will load. I think (if I recall?) @Mikki had a similar issue with Kerbalism and the number of saves (forgive me for dragging you in!). So, I think I could just unload Kerbalism, load the save, kill 10-15 old flights, re-install Kerbalism and proceed, but I am not sure how the game will like being loaded without the Kerbalism parts. Unless anyone sees a simpler solution that I do not?...

I am set to try this this evening, with a twist- after renaming copies of the Persistent files, I have started a new game with the same settings and copied over those Persistent files, hoping that when the game loads it will be to a Day 1 setting with nothing going on, and then I will be able to load a select save file (the old persistent which is my active game) from there. If this doesn't work, then I will simply try running a normal persistent load from a copy as you suggest.

Interesting. So, rename it to AttemptNo1.whatever, save it, then rename it Persistent and save it again? Ok, I'll try that at this point. What happens though if there is no 'persistent' save at all when you select what game to load? Does it pick the most recent save after that, or does it blurp and faint because there is no Persistent to load?

Sorry! I'll edit that.

The Duna Mapping Probe, continued... The DIO Bus now made a burn to place it in its first Duna orbit, a 500km relay orbit. Next, the DIO Bus orbit needed to be lowered to 100km, which was the first time that the Bus would be under unbalanced propulsion. Just prior to entering Duna SOI one of the landers had lost its reaction wheel, so not only was the Bus mass unbalanced but so was the control input. The maneuver however was executed nominally, though with notable control input being exercised by the probe CPU to maintain desired alignment. Now the 2nd WWYT relay satellite could be deployed, and as well the Duna Equatorial Lander. The DIO Bus then performs its final burn, to place it on a polar mapping orbit. This would also be its most unbalanced burn as but a single probe remains attached. This burn also is successfully carried out however, and the Bus prepares to deploy its final lander for a polar landing. After the lander begins its burn to descent, for which there is fuel for constant deceleration to the surface (required to reduce mass as much as possible for maximum efficacy of the parachutes). The probe makes atmospheric interface, and immediately sends a data set to the Orbiter for relay to Kerbin. As the probe descends deeper and deeper into the atmosphere however, the low thrust issue of the descent motor again rears its head. Seeing as the design incorporates static panels on the landing legs as well as the extendable arrays, the unforeseen application of drag deeper in the atmosphere suddenly unbalanced the craft beyond the ability of engine or reaction wheels to compensate for. The lander would simply need tumble until its drogue chutes could deploy to stabilize it, after which the first landing on Duna was accomplished, upon its carbon-dioxide northern polar cap. The Polar Probe then surveys its surroundings, sending back marvelous imagery to the Orbiter of Kerbol's bright shine radiating off escarpments and plains. Finally now it was the Equatorial Lander's turn, and a canyon basin was targeted near some possible recent-past flow channels, where conceivably water might have run. The Equatorial Probe's performance was similar, including the stability issues, but as that was now expected it caused little consternation as the data streamed in. Given the much lower altitude reached here than that which the Polar Probe encountered, parachute performance was superior, though retro propulsion was still used through contact. The Duna-Ike mission plan was complete, and now it only remained for all the data to acquired and beamed back home to an eager and joyful Kerbin.

Oktober 16, the 62nd year of the People's Era The first of the two Duna craft enters the planet's gravitational influence, one of K-Tech's robust landers with its injection stage still attached, and maneuvers to make orbit around Ike. Having selected its landing "mare" and discarded the Duna Injection Stage, the craft descends by the Ike Insertion Stage, as the control team strives to maximize the available Dv for the return trip. Upon final approach to the landing zone the Insertion Stage is discarded late, from which the scientists start screaming from the observation lounge as there is no way their landing field would not now be contaminated with unspent propellant and metals. After the the stage is discarded though something inexplicably goes amiss. In the previous 3 flights of this design, which successfully landed on and returned from both Minmus and Mun, the Injection stage had been discarded at an altitude of 6 to 8 kilometers followed by descent on the landing engine. Here above Ike however at an altitude of just over 100 meters the probe, suddenly on its descent motor, slews off its line, and after a swift assimilation of data determining that the rotation is both being properly responded too *and* unrecoverable, the CPU cuts power to the engine which would now only be adding lateral velocity. Seeing a 40m drop from which catastrophic damage was probable the CPU fired the seismic sensors in the hopes that at least something would be left functional after landing. The end result was entirely unpredictable. Later diagnostics would seem to indicate that the only component casualties were 2 of the variable solar arrays and one landing leg, but long engineering meetings would need to be had before a decision on how, or whether to, proceed with a future return attempt- K-Tech would need to be consulted. The science panels were all run, except for the soil experiment which could not now contact the regolith. This mission was set aside at this moment however, as a few days later the Duna-Ike Probe also entered Duna's gravity well. This would be a very busy mission, as 4 probes and 2 relays would need to be deployed, and 5 different orbits managed. First, after entering Ike orbit the two Ike Landers are deployed, and the first of them began its landing attempt. Unfortunately, for some reason the probe was providing incorrect altitude-above-terrain data, which was off by 2700 meters, which would have been the time margin for satelite relay coverage to be assured. As it was, the DIO Bus orbited out of LOS, and the probe dropped with no data link. Subsequently, the DIO Bus was was moved to a higher orbit, so when IL2 attempted its landing coverage would be complete. The work around Ike was now complete, as the science data from both landing sites was relayed back to Kerbin. Next, the DIO Bus would need to break orbit and deploy its two WWYT Relay Satellites at two different altitudes above Duna. [Part 2 to Follow]

4,000 km drive? Good gracious, how long did that take you at the PC? On my system it would be days, literally.

Now do it with Kerbalism.