Blaarkies

Not all of the deployable science equipment gathers science on Kerbin (the Mystery goo machine did nothing for me). I don't know about the others, I think the grand slam worked though. But your setup seems fine (barring the lack of electricity, just add more solar panels), putting this same setup as is on Mun should start uploading science every few Kerbin days

NCD run complete! Busy with a write up here: The Mun rover was such a chore, I had a few close calls where i wish i had more reaction wheels. Luckily I only needed to farm 8.3 biomes on Mun (it has plenty more). I'm going to add some more interesting bits to the write up, any tips and stuff i can think of to help new Caveman challenge members.

This contains my entry for the Caveman Challenge 1.12 (it's about completing the tech tree without upgrading buildings) Below I will explain my missions and strategy to accomplish the "Nano-crystalline Diamond" (or NCD) level of the Caveman Challenge, it is the absolute hardest setting in stock KSP. It is just career mode with the following limitations No upgrading any buildings Custom difficulty, every slider on the lowest/harshest setting 10% rewards for science , funds , reputation Max 120% re-entry heating 0 starting funds ...you get the idea, it is ridiculously difficult the first time you see it (Details can be found on the Caveman challenge topic) You win when all Tier 1-5 tech tree nodes have been unlocked Strategy Green Monoliths are easter eggs that spawn in random locations (1 for each planet/moon). Discovering them on location will unlock a random available tech tree node The most recent challenge rules allow the usage of these "available" tech nodes in-game are defined by having their parent node(s) already unlocked, but Green Monoliths don't care about building level limitation (they can potentially unlock Tier 6+ tech nodes without you upgrading the R&D building) The Tier 5 nodes cost 90 each, and there are 3 Grenoliths in the Kerbin system nearby. Holding out until we unlocked all Tier 4 techs, means that we can save ourselves getting 270 Holding onto contracts for the parts they provide for testing, gives us some usage of those parts, at the expense of holding 1 contract slot closed Use small steps instead of leaps to reduce risk. Funds, kerbal lives, contract slots are all things that can end NCD runs if they run out Lessons learned Green Monoliths are not shortcuts to skipping science. In Caveman mode, it takes as much time to detect anomalies (and visit all of them), than it takes to just go and collect science on Mun The Minmus Grenolith was the easiest: There is only 1 other anomaly on Minmus, so spotting the Grenolith is simple Mun/Kerbin have lots of easter eggs, which look identical on the Kerbnet detection system. If you are not familiar with the easter eggs on Kerbin and Mun, be prepared to visit 5-15 locations on each before getting that Grenolith The random tech might not be Tier 5 (helping achieve the Caveman challenge). It could be a Tier 6, which sounds great, unless it is something like "Command Modules", "Adv. Fuel Systems", "Heavier Rocketry"(what are you supposed to to with a Mainsail? ) "Rover" ships work great on Minmus! 4 Wheels are enough to farm 100% Minmus science in a short time frame (possibly faster than preparing launcher for hop landers) Mun, not so great. It needs more wheels, reaction wheels, solar panels and batteries to keep up with the higher gravity Robotics on an "Engineer Van" can hoist a ladder some +10 m up into the air Build rockets in the VAB that are over part count, then remove the small bits (science equipment, batteries, antennae, ...) and click launch From the Runway (or before the main rocket was built), launch an Engineer Van containing all the missing parts, and Bill (engineer), and maybe Valentina to help assist with the heavier parts Ride out to the launchpad, hoist them up and add the missing parts Launchpad construction vehicles can be built with a rectangular wing as the base, it save on part count, allowing for more wheels HG-5 antenna (a little retractably relay dish) is vastly superior to the Communitron-16. The HG-5 is heavier, but has enough range out at Minmus, and even connects to other relays better because of the improved strength (try it out here: ksp-visual-calculator.blaarkies.com) Before you start your own challenge run The Caveman Challenge (on normal) is fun, it pushes you to accomplish what seems impossible to 90% of KSP players The NCD level is different; it is a commitment, expect to play it for 40+ hours, doing 100+ launches You need to be sure that you know how to launch on a shoestring budget Be sure to understand the career system 100% How does science work, where to find extra science that is not immediately obvious (KSC micro-biomes) Which contracts are best for funds, how to get around bad contracts Be comfortable with the CommNet system; losing signal of an unmanned probe launching eastward, or behind Mun, or out at Minmus, are real issues you need to consider with every launch Correction burns halfway en route to Minmus can become difficult because of this There is a tool for this : ksp-visual-calculator.blaarkies.com How much DV is required to move around the Kerbin system (and possibly Duna/Eve) You will be building rockets that cannot be refueled, and they won't be "cheap" relative to the amount of funds that you have; they need enough DV to complete at least part of their mission You won't have fancy colorful patched-conics orbital trajectories. Returning from Mun low-orbit, means escaping Mun at a certain angle, at a certain velocity; do you know what those are before the burn starts? Piloting skills; you will be landing planes on Kerbin, probes on Mun, and possibly Bob (scientist) on Minmus while he is hanging onto a ladder. Any landing needs to be easy to you because you won't have proper SAS for most of these landings Breaking things on landing could bust the whole mission and bankrupt your space program NCD is arguably 10x harder than Normal difficulty, since you only get 1/10 of the rewards, but profits aren't that simple. The difference between contract reward and launch cost determines how difficult it is, making it potentially even harder If any of the previous points had you thinking too long, it is best to try the easier levels first and see how you like it Topaz[Hard] goes by much quicker than this, and introduces a fair bit of the challenges faced here There are levels between Hard and NCD if you feel confident in your skills After completing any level of Caveman Challenge, you realize how overbudget we have been building craft for simple missions all along Screenshots The Start See the Diamond run for tips on how to get going with 0 funds Starting important tip: Don't throw darts above 30km ! They tend to dive down, nose first at the speed of sound. You can't control them, and parachutes don't work at those speeds There are many solutions, I chose to pick a "test the decoupler" contract and use the part for my own needs for a while We need to build a backup supply of funds, we need it to unscrew ourselves if a launch fails. Grab 2 contracts that have a high chance of succeeding (things like "test parachute at 5km", or "test thing on launchpad"). Then do a tiny launch where you hop the vehicle onto some KSC buildings. The primary objective is making funds, so complete the contracts and recover the entire craft. The secondary objective is getting science to unlock new tools. The first 10 launches from KSC will probably all yield some science. Once we unlock more science equipment, we need to do this again. Remember to unlock tools first (the parts we need to make funds), everything leading up to placing satellites in orbit will help, science equipment comes second here. Do small hops, nothing dangerous. After about 15+ of these we will have most KSC science grabbed for this level and some backup funds as insurance. Go for orbit when ready, but that won't mean you are done with the KSC yet...there is still lots to be done down there "Science Rollers" can easily be "driven" by using the trim controls (actually designed for aircraft). Turn off SAS. Hold down `left Alt` and press `q`. You should see the Roll control indicator move (bottom left of screen). But unlike when we control it with the keyboard (making the indicators max out on each key press), this trim will gently feather it to roll very slowly You can release Alt now. This works for all controls (roll, yaw, pitch) and even translation controls (i, j, k, l, keys for RCS stuff, but i bound my rover wheel controls to them as well). Later you can make rover wheel "lead-footed" so that they keep driving forward without you there If things get out of hand, just turn on SAS (it nullifies these trim values). You can also reset trim with `left Alt + X` Always check to spot this one. A Terrier test contract is gold at this point, we can keep the contract (uncompleted) for 401 Kerbin days if we want, without any penalty. We don't have a Terrier part yet, but they will be extremely useful on the orbital craft we just built moments ago. Keep this golden contract until we are ready to unlock our own Terrier part (meaning we also have to be careful about locking up a contract slot with this), but we can always complete it at-launchpad if we ever get into trouble at least. With a Terrier onboard, it becomes much easier reaching Mun and Minmus, where we find a lot of extra science in orbit. This part gets a bit repetitive, because we might not have all the science equipment unlocked yet, meaning we have to go back later again. But since it is all orbital stuff, we will definitely be going through this region again anyway where we can scoop up left over science. Once we are ready in terms of technology (farm all the easy science near KSC to help unlock unmanned rocket parts) we can start using probes for everything. They are cheaper, it hurts less when they are lost, and we can leave them in orbit to provide a benefit. Forget about the Communitron 16 for these, the HG-5 High Gain antenna is so much more powerful, and it provides relay. The idea with these will be to: build a relay communications network for future launches scan Kerbin/Mun/Minmus for anomolies and mark them as navigation points provide in orbit probes that can transmit science for contracts if we ever hit a dead end for funds At first, some probes won't have solar panels. That is fine, they will relay comm signals as long as they had power the last time you checked them (if you ignore them for 100 years, they will still be functional relay sats, but if you go and control the craft personally, it will shut off). These craft will mostly help launches of newer and better craft. Every launch should be accompanied by enough contracts to cover the launch cost. If we can't pull this off, we need to do silly launch pad contracts to make up the funds that we will need. The satellite contracts can payout 7 000 - 13 000 which cover the launch cost unless the craft has many science experiments onboard. A 2nd contract is pure profit at this point, allowing us to leave a relay/kerbnet probe in orbit somewhere. We will need little bits of science from everywhere possible. This one is dangerous, and the payoff isn't even great, but i wanted some EVA flying science. I strapped Jeb into this...thing, let it launch and then parachute Jeb down to find some more science, somewhere. The S2 roverwheel part is also pretty important, for clearing up the rest of the KSC science. We can get this via a contract for free, but later on it will also be useful for roving Minmus. It is worth researching, but other things are more critical. Remember the hidden science. Some of these sound ridiculous, but they exist. "Landed at Kerbin's water"...gives a new meaning to ships finding land. There are many versions of these going on in game, like "Splashed down at Kerbin's Deserts" is obviously a craft floating in an oasis, but in the end they all give unique science that might not have been collected before. Before landing anywhere other than Kerbin, remember to go get the contract for those. It is usually worth a lot of funds, and sometimes 1. This part is all about the delicate balance of funds, science, and monoliths. Every satellite needs funding to launch, so we will have to find some contract mission that fits together nicely (2 satellite contracts around Minmus is a great start). Then we can determine what kind of science we gain while being there (maybe a landing is possible, or maybe it is better to leave a relay in orbit) Don't be surprised after doing 10+ of these missions just for Minmus, we need to be thorough. Before solar panels, keep an eye on the EC supply (leave the craft before that empties out). Once the we solar panels, we can do a full KerbNet scan of where we are orbiting and mark those anomolies. Anomalies on Minmus are easy: It has 1 black monolith (gives us a tiny bit of funds for discovering it), and 1 green monolith (unlocks a new tech for free) It is worthwhile detecting all anomalies now, even if we don't visit/discover them (that might unlock some lowly T2/T3/T4 techs). Once we unlock the last T4 tech with science points, we can discover these anomalies for a guaranteed T5+ tech. After the very long science collection missions, once we have all the critical parts unlocked, we can unlock the lowest tier nodes in order to hunt monoliths on Kerbin. Don't try that without planes, Kerbin has far too many anomalies to do a rocket launch for each. We will find many false positives. These ground stations show up as anomalies, and they are actually easy to spot as long as you keep an eye on the mountain peaks. Sometimes you get lucky finding an easter egg outside of the savegame A well designed plane can easily get past the poles, even to Badlands. Finally made it to Woomerang. This won't unlock the launch site (since difficulty settings disable it), but the same discovery of Cove or Island Airfield will allow you to launch from them. After a lot of struggling on Kerbin, i decided to go get the Minmus monolith instead. They don't need Kerbals close by, only a controlled craft in physics range (some 2.3 km). Maybe this works with debris as well if the camera is tracking them. At some point, we need larger launch vehicles. With docking ports unlocked, we can add boosters afterwards, on top of the full 18t limit. To build these forklifts, it help using a wing segment as the base structure. ...more to come, look at the Screenshots in the meanwhile

I have been wondering about using a launch pad to the west, maybe the desert runway? (you'll need the DLC for this, but one of the Easter egg launch sites could work in a similar fashion) Launching east from there, could place the first stage's trajectory right over the KSC before reaching orbit, giving enough time to switch to the payload and insert that into orbit, then switch back to the first stage and let that "re-enter" and fly in the atmosphere however you want. You'll need to stretch what can be considered a "booster" at this point, it will be close to itself being in orbit before releasing the payload.

Bob on Jeb's Mun rover! ...knocking a golf ball off a solar panel, what could go wrong? It wasn't all that hard since Bob was still in an elliptical orbit between Kerbin and Mun, the biggest problem is limiting thrust to at maximum 1g for fear of Bob losing his grip during landing. I should have added some foot-pad with engineer construction when i had the chance The wheels hold up ok, but they seem under more stress than i'd like (also more grip would have been nice). In hindsight i would try 8 wheels instead (symmetry would be a nightmare with in-flight construction). The main craft fuel tank is still full, so driving will become easier after 1-2 hops. The mission has a half-size fuel tank waiting in orbit to be used to get back to Kerbin, so i can hop around with most of this fuel

Thats a bummer. I made most of my funds from tiny contracts, the kind where you test at launch pad, and/or parachutes at <5km. I used these while farming KSC science so that everything is recoverable. It probably takes longer than the roller design, but it makes money on every launch. Once I get a Terrier contract, i keep that and start tackling satellite contract (but you still have to build extremely cheap on those, because you only have 1 usable contract slot then), so i only started this when i had some capital to fall back on.

I didn't realize this part, thanks! I'm in the works on doing the same thing on Mun, it just takes more fuel tanks (and launches) to get the rover on the Mun's surface. I hope the wheels hold under the stronger gravity. I still need like +-280 to complete my NCD run.

The easier way i found was to start cutting down on payload mass for the accent vehicle. I wanted to get a kerbal from Eve surface to orbit? So why send a command pod with when they only need a lawnchair inside a fairing? If you have the Breaking Ground DLC installed, such a lifter can mass less than 10t. I can't find the craft file anymore, but I remember using ducted propellers up to about 30 km altitude. From there, I left them running and decoupled the propeller section, pulling itself away from the craft which then fire it's engines. I didn't even need to use the Kerbal EVA jetpack to insert into orbit, so there was even more mass that could be cut. I'm not saying throw your own ideas away and just do this (it was fun for me too the first time figuring out how to do it with rockets only, it took about 50t at surface). But the smaller, lighter and simpler you make the craft, the easier it becomes to get that thing down through Eve re-entry in one piece. I wish there was some achievements tracker in KSP (regardless of platform) just to see what percentage of players actually achieve this for real in stock...I bet it is less than 5%

First time i heard of this term, i love it! Ground based docking has become harder since 1.12, until the docking port strut issue gets fixed. Ever since Engineer in-flight construction became stock, there has been so many possibilities for getting larger, more complex parts to LEO

To get around the 30 part count limit, i tried adding the extra parts on-launchpad instead. This worked pretty well; so the robotics easily hoisted up Bill to the command pod to add some batteries, a parachute and anything else I wish. This is the 3rd drive up to the rocket though: I learned that parachutes are too heavy for 1 kerbal to handle, so Bill had to come back with Valentina close by. It seems promising, i want to test post-building inside of fairings later on. I hope you can build the entire probe part with tiny engines on the launch pad

KerbNet can spot them for you, they will show up as anomalies. Ironically i got frustrated finding them instead of Green Monoliths You might need many different probes (or just lots of time with 1 probe) to spot lots of anomalies.

Cut down on dry-mass. This will reduce the amount of fuel + engines you need to lift that into orbit. Making the final deployed payload - the satellite portion - 25% lighter will also make it possible to remove 25% of the rest of the rocket and still reach orbit. Unfortunately many kerbal designs are, well kerbal, and are not as simple as 3 stages and a satellite. At which point it helps more to simplify the mission instead.

Rocket stages (sequential) with equal DV per stage form a roughly pyramid shape, where the bottom stage is x-times heavier than everything above it. Let's start with the probe core, it is the payload, and it masses 1t Now build a stage below it with a mass of 2t (the total rocket mass will now be 3t) Next, build a stage below all of this. The "payload" for this stage, is 3t (everything above it), so this new bottom stage needs to be 6t The total rocket mass is 9t at this point This followed a 2x rule of thumb, it works alright at getting good dv per funds, but you can obviously use a different number NERV/Ion stages will definitely be better with a different number Tylo landers, Eve ascent vehicles will need way more engine/thrust This makes designs really simple, but once you are in orbit, drop tanks will out perform anything else...unless you have mission requirements for re-usability (i got to the 2x value by eyeballing some wet/dry mass vs DV graphs, i think anything around 2-3x seemed good for Terrier engines, but it is worth experimenting with different ratios and techniques)

Bob on a "rover" on Minmus! It is surprisingly easy, and effective...although, time consuming to drive around at 10 m/s. At least there isn't a lot of risk involved. It only took 3 launches: the first one had some BACC boosters attached on the launch pad by two trams. And of course Bill had to add struts on after that because of the docking port strut-bug a simple launch to get Bob into orbit outside of a capsule (in one of those 1.25m containers) another launch to get the science base parts in orbit (the orange adaptor in the back) It already farmed 3 biomes (and a Minmus rock ), and it still has some fuel to do a few hops if I need to. I can't get enough about how awesome the Waterfall mod looks! I swear even my framerate is better as well EDIT: Got it done, farmed 100% of Minmus (or probably 95%, those material bay samples always leave a tiny bit of science out) It took probably 2-3 IRL hours of rover driving, but it feels longer. Luckily Minmus has a quite smooth surface along the north pole, just be careful going down into the flats. Comparing the total time of this mission, i think this might be faster than hoppers since they require so many fueling missions to get 100% biomes...but you need rover wheels of course

This will sound weird at first, but it worked once for me: If you are using an HDMI cable between your computer <-> monitor, try switching to a different cable/port on either side My issue was that the HDMI port on my GPU was damaged, so once I switched to the DVI cable/port all these issues were gone. I had the same stretched triangles in my games as in your screenshots (i never imagined cable connections could lead to that) (I'm not saying the port was the primary reasons for my issue, but switching ports did help in the end)

Version 1.1.1 Mobile-friendly versions of all large visual elements Create/edit craft window; adding craft with many antennae will now be much easier Edit Celestial Body, FAQ, Manage save games, and Feedback windows, all have better layouts on mobile Rearranged menus into a compact row of buttons; easy to reach on mobile Adjust the Zoom Indicator to the current screen size; it will no longer zoom off beyond Eeloo Fixes Auto-saving did not start immediately Tutorial popups appeared off-screen App name changing to "KSP Visual Calculator" The old name was too specific, it would constrict the app from going to the Mun The old link won't be disabled yet, it will still point to the app like normal The new link is "https://ksp-visual-calculator.blaarkies.com/" If you run into any issues, please post feedback about it.

After finally picking up the Green monolith on Kerbin, I learned that they unlock tech regardless of the R&D building's level! This means that a caveman can unlock most caveman tech nodes with Kerbin system science, then pickup the 3 Grenoliths in the Kerbin SOI and possibly obtain the Mobile Processing Lab to just farm everything else Obviously they can chicken out of 270 by letting it unlock 3x 90 tech nodes, which was my plan all along...but now this curve ball really complicates that. All tier 5 nodes have to be unlocked to complete the challenge im guessing, but what about the usage of T6 parts?

Yeah thats the one, your explanation is on point! What always bugged me about this one is that a single aircraft type is used to define the number. It would certainly be higher if the equation is calculated using a lighter, more streamlined aircraft that provides more lift (the max altitude with better tech probably won't be 10's of km higher anyway)

It depends a bit on the exact definition of orbit. If it wasn't for the atmosphere, you could orbit at sea level (or maybe slightly higher to barely miss the mountains). Compare it to flying: a commercial airliner operates with mostly lift, as opposed to centripetal force, but a spaceplane starts off relying on lift, and at some point gets into such thin atmosphere that it no longer relies on lift, but rather relies on the centripetal force (the going-fast-sideway force that keeps things in orbit) So the question becomes: Keeping a spaceplane in a circular orbit, at which height of this orbit will the plane no longer need wings? (this is oversimplified, because there are so many variables at play) - I think the Karman line is based on such a comparison (rather check the wiki incase i ruined it) For the highest orbit, would you consider it an orbit if it escapes earth, just to be slingshoted back from Jupiter decades later, in some very unlikely but repeating resonance? - if it wasn't for all the other gravity source (sun, planets), the maximum orbit is near infinite

Version 1.1.0 Save games; you can now save the current configuration of planets and craft in the app, and load it back up next time Sign in account; to access save game storage simply sign in to the app. This allows saving/loading your personal list of save games on many devices (e.g. on a tablet while playing KSP on your computer) Simple email/password accounts are supported, as well as Google accounts Import/Export save games to .json files; share these files with other players to show your ideas, better explain a specific situation in your game, or post it on the forums for others to load Auto-save; keeps your currently selected game up to date as you make changes Manage save games; rename, delete, or reset specific games as you see fit Touch screen support; drag planets around with your finger, or zoom in by pinching the universe between two fingers Mobile (small screen) support is currently in beta, some text panels might not fit properly on screen and some features might not function as intended Double-click planets to focus; double-tap on touch screen devices for the same effect Loading screen on startup; some eye-candy while you wait Fixes Relay signal lines had a visual bug when 2 lines on screen appeared perpendicular to each other Some tutorial steps could be skipped accidentally without completing the actual task Some tutorial panels would appear off screen Added help section about camera controls If you run into any issues, please post feedback about it.

(I wish the forums had simple emoji reactions to posts, but a full reply is the only way) I hope it wasn't too many hours into the save game? That sucks , but I guess now you know about more things to look out for. I'd like to hear how you solve/prevent this in the next run

The re-entry heating hasn't bothered me yet, i just yeet probes back from Minmus to Kerbin with a 30km Pe and they survive just fine. I think a simple heatshield(empty) on a crew capsule will be more than enough protection. Once you get a Terrier contract to hold on to (and land on Minmus biomes), you will be on a fast pace towards late caveman. The next step seems to be proper crewed landings which needs more than an 18t launch for me I got this idea of continuing on the NCD save after completion, maybe without upgrading the launchpad/runway so that you have to make do with the 18t limit, but you still get to unlock better tech? Not sure how that will play out though

Not sure, but I'm guessing you are using numpad for translation (which requires RCS), and WASD for rotation (which can rely on reaction wheels)? In the main menu settings, enable "Advanced Tweakables". In the VAB, right-click on the RCS port and open the "Actuation Toggles". Here you can disable the RCS port for Yaw/Pitch/Roll. Now when in flight, you can rotate the craft with WASD relying on reaction wheels, and use IJKL/numpad to do RCS translation moves.

I just tried ground docking port construction again, and ran into a surprise: So normally to fix the skew boosters, you just have to setup auto-strut between the boosters and the core, and then timewarp for just a few seconds. Coming out of time warp, physics will reset the boosters to align vertically as if in the VAB. Auto-strut would then hold them like that, and problem solved. But in v1.12 there is a bug the stops auto-strut from working across docking ports: I guess it's time for Bill to go manual-strut each booster before disconnecting the forklifts

Try to hover the mouse cursor over the signal strength in the top-left portion of the screen (while controlling the craft). When hovering the mouse cursor over it, a tooltip should appear that states which Craft/Station is part of the connection path