Dynamo

I love it. Like Rune, i've not been on KSP for the past few days because Xenonauts. Those blasted aliens, always stealing snacks and terrorizing space centers. Does it have seats? I'd love to do a mock landing with it.

Awesome to hear that things have cooled down over there, we're glad nothing serious happened. Anyaways, i'm sure everyone's giddy to see the return of the Grand Tour. Write on!

This has come up before on one or two threads. I also do not like stealing current names of spacecraft, it ruins my immersion and dedication to my own program. Stealing a name is as good as copying a ship, to me. With that established, I decided to mimic the trend, using mythology as an inspiration. Real space programs often did name their missions after fabled figures, such as with Apollo, Mercury, and Gemini, and the planets are also named after Roman gods. In such spirit, I "simulate" Latin by modifying Latin-esque syllables, prefixes, and suffixes into compelling names, creating a original, yet inspired feel of the imperial power that Latin gives. For example, my IPV missions are all named with this system: IPV-1: Astrium IPV-2: Aletherium IPV-3: Gatheriax IPV-4: Talyos IPV-5: Aurux IPV-6: Tyberius IPV-7: Vagus (Actual Latin translation for 'Wanderer') Most of my inter-Kerbin vessels are simply purpose-named ('Crew Shuttle') or have unique ones outside the Latin convention. Hope this helps! It doesn't have to be something deeply inspired, just find a topic or theme that resonates with you.

Excellent craft, Czo. You've continued to raise the bar with every chapter, and I congratulate you. While I must lament the death of the kerbals, it now appears that we know Death Is Cheap for Czo, but it adds a bittersweet character to the story all the more that makes us treasure those still living. As for Rozer, I think Jeb'll leave him to die. No doubt they'll play the great ethical debate, but I think Jeb'll be in the mood for the death penalty for Rozer, after performing such an atrocious desertion for science; no doubt crew deaths are definitely Jeb's Berserk Button. Props for subtly questioning the value of science over kerbal life, Czo. Personally, I'm all for a pardoning of Rozer, however. It's clear that beneath the veil of indoctrination he has something of a soul to be saved (he hesitated before 'murdering' Sid). P.S. : I also liked your tribute to the Apollo 13 disaster. I believe this was the first indication of the problem that the Odyssey's sensors gave to the crew.

This is.... beautiful. Only the muses could craft such a hysterical piece. It fits perfectly, I must commend you.

I'll throw in a request. I'm currently throwing together an "IPV" program that my space program, Field Dynamics, will use to send probes to every planetary system in the Kerbin system. I'd like a circular patch with "IPV-7 : Vagus" (Vagus is Latin for wanderer, for the curious) in NASA lettering curving across the top, just below the white border with the company name (Field Dynamics) written in black on the border, with two stars at the beginning and end. The border will surround a star field wherein the planets will line up in distance order from the Sun (Moho first, Eeloo last), and i'd like the line to curve along the right side so that Moho is at the 5 o'clock position, and Eeloo ends up around 12 to 2-ish. The KSP probe icon will lie on the left, with an arrow extending to each of the planets. The bottom text will read "In Reliquum" (the company motto). I hope I didn't overwhelm you - I just got picky about my idea. Feel free to ask me for any clarifications. Thanks for the patch in advance, and I hope I like it; I might contract you to do all of my IPV program patches

The Kerbal icon has been in the map mode since the beginning of EVA's; of course they planned for stupid stunts like this. Danny2462 even deorbited a kerbal using just the EVA pack. I must laud you for this difficult feat!

This is a most profound development. I believe we're seeing the start of something new here that may fall into legend.

Yeah, i've actually had an extreme amount of difficulty balancing my fuel and TWR woes with my ambitious payload weights, so i could use a few pointers in this department as well. Still, though, it provides an excellent challenge - designing your interplanetary vehicle is half the fun, honestly. To this end, i've avoided Vanamonde's showcase save for inspiration. I don't want to 'copy' or 'cheat' off of someone else's engineering, as i cannot find the fun in that. However, if i can be pointed to some good advice for engineering these behemoths, my engineers would be greatly appreciate it.

I do enjoy the challenge of stock weaponry, but i think it lacks potential in how the 'damage modeling' is conducted. Mind you, KSP isn't a combat simulator, but if there was a push to have damage models for parts as opposed to the 'total kill hitbox' that we use, there could be some very interesting stock weapon products.... We could burst the main fuel tank while it still held fuel, perhaps even ignite it for a mega-explosion, or target critical structural systems to make pinpoint criticals. But with the current models for damage, the Lazor parts and others take the cake. I'm sorry Macey, your videos show the bleeding edge of stock warfare (an excellent display, i cannot say anything less), but those weapons are designed to wreak havoc. You can attempt to 'strafe' a ground target with stock missiles, and reload about 52 times hoping for a kinetic connection, but nothing beats ground warfare like pasting the target with a huge bomb.

Sigbin Kerman. May as well be Jeb's stepbrother for all the stunts i've had him pull.

Interplanetary vehicles out to the planets. I'm slowly etching my way out to other planets, but my ability to design, fly, and hold stable the Big Rigs is poor at best. I do hope that will improve with experience, however, as i believe i've got the background knowledge and piloting skills to adapt further to IP travel. I have also just conquered the SSTO front, though just barely. I would love to improve on them and create some real haulers i can park and refuel for another mission taking a crew rotation or something of that nature.

Personally, i use a theme for a series/program of rockets. All of my interplanetary vehicles use a Latin-esque name under the guise of Roman characters (with some originality over real life spacecraft such as the Mercury program) for an austere flair bonus plus a personality. You could choose a theme for the program, and create words or images from that themeset by imitating it. For example, if i use a Cherokee Native theme, i might choose Tlanooche to christen a ship, and that's just my poor imitation of Cherokee language.

I'm doing my own AAR about the development of my space program, prequel style, using the tech tree and career mode. I've come to appreciate what it is to write one of these, and i laud you for getting past the most difficult task of starting the thing. Good luck, and i can't wait for more character development!

This is quite a visionary addition. I wonder what form interstellar travel will take, and how vehicles will change in designing for interplanetary. I imagine something like Avatar's Interstellar Venture Star. But i'm quite worried about a crushing partcount requirement with such massive ships, but it'd be well worth it to see this kind of thing. I also imagine an asteroid belt within a 30 to 40 billion meter range of the asteroid belt where we can have 3 or four large asteroids (perhaps 50 km longest axis) with a small gap between orbits (perhaps 150 million meters between the closest) but large distance in orbital period between each other, an interesting concept since we haven't much of a real asteroid field except Dres. This is amazing - please keep us posted with ideas, and i do hope to see what the rest of the community has as far as another star is concerned.

Thanks for the interesting discussion everyone, and special thanks to Sal for making an appearance. As a clarification, i'm noticing quite a few of our opinions are coming into some common conclusions, so for newcomers (and to recap), here's the short list of what we think so far (at least 2-3 users both suggested or endorsed these): 1. Choosing science experiment loadouts is an interesting mechanic. 2. Career mode is in its infancy. Please don't harp on our criticisms like we don't know that, as we're all aware of the fact. 3. Tech unlocks should be related to the experiments conducted rather than through and arbitrary points system. (Personally, i didn't mention this concern in my original post as i saw too many balancing issues with it.) 4. Mission goals should be set to give science output for a flight rather than experiments conducted while you happen to be flying somewhere.

I suppose this would fall under more IVA control. It'd be cool to be able to move Kerbals around the cockpit rather than just leaning forward, and perhaps look out a window at another angle. If we could move Kerbals and not just their view angles, we could improve on the visibility of IVA's, not only giving a wider FOV but also different angles out the window.

Oh dear. I've been writing an entire AAR about the origin of my program based on my first playthrough of career mode as a prequel. I can't fit that in a post, but i'll give a back-cover background: Built off private funds of a directorship, what was a private atmospheric research association quickly became a multinational agency for space exploration and contracting. Field Dynamics was born in the Gardian flats, where it was built as a private research firm into the relatively new technology of rocket propulsion. As its 'soundings' reached new and daunting heights, it became clear that the agency could face a new directive: the exploration of space. As the Field Dynamics grew into a bustling company, it gained popularity, experience, and achievement as it first moved into orbit, conducting experiments for the betterment of Kerbal technology and corporate firms worldwide. Field Dynamics showed its full prowess in time, however, when it became one of the few and only private firms to land Kerbals on the Mun, and maintain that capability. The firm then spent a long time contracting payload orbit services, crew rotations, and design assistance, and its design wings created several civilian and military designs for licensed produciton and direct sales that further catapulted the company to a worldwide status. These sales and contributions built what is now the Volantis Space Center as it is known today, where the modern Field Dynamics has grown. Today, Field Dynamics stands amongst the foremost space programs in technology and capability, pushing the boundaries of private-based exploration and engineering as its IPV program reaches beyond Kerbin with investor based funding and research contracts facilitating the colonization and study of the entire Kerbal system and the many secrets it holds for Kerbalkind, or for whoever writes the next check.

The purpose of this thread is to discuss the current science system. Before the community acknowledges it, though, i must point out that i know that the science system is still in development. These are my current criticisms based off the model being used in version 0.22, which i shall voice to hopefully give Squad some feedback or ideas on how the community perceives this system, and where it should be headed. I welcome discussion and debate on this topic, as it can only bring a more accurate model of the community's perception of science. Please do also note, these criticisms are only from about tech 2 or 3, based on my own save file. (For those don't want to read the entirety of my argument, the tl;dr points are in bold) So, congratulations, Squad. I'm astounded at the pace of development that gave me the 0.22 update at least 2 months before I thought it would be released. I laud this achievement, and cannot say you left anything half baked. The new parts, systems, and subassemblies are wonderful additions to the game. I also do appreciate this early career mode release, and the Research that goes with it. But i most come to terms with a few minor grievances i have against it: 1. Lack of a Kerbal 'Space' Program: The system of mapping biomes to facilitate experiments for each of Kerbin's biomes is a wonderful achievement. It provides a diverse base of science to work with (and segway into the resource system with), and encourages exploration. The issue that comes to mind, though, is how the current balancing encourages rocket based exploration of those areas. In one situation, i noted a community forum discussing the best methods to acquire science points while in the Kerbin system. Many users suggested landing in the different biomes, as each gives a full science project for you to recover, and advance the space program with. It makes sense - early on, at the tier 1 or 2 tech, we have neither rovers nor aircraft, and we don't have good enough rocket parts to get to the Mun, but we can make suborbital hops to each biome with our rockets. However, i do think that this encourages a different kind of gameplay just for points. I feel motivated to go on missions exploring the void, looking to divine the secrets that the Kerbals are just uncovering in the wonders of space. But, there is only 1 set of experiments for Kerbin's orbit/near space, whilst there are many different Biome reports once you land. This encourages a "land program," where space quickly dries up its science in the infant stages of the tech tree, and we're left lobbing Kerbals to different parts of the planet to gain science. But, if a space program (ex. the Mercury Program) is developed to look into the final frontier after we have explored our home planet, why is there more to discover on Kerbin than in the unknown void? The Mercury program brought an infinite number of experiments and questions to light about space, and in KSP we can cover that all in one flight. So, until we go to the Mun and beyond, we're stuck lobbing kerbalnauts into 'new' biomes. I know that it's a balancing mechanic, and flooding the tree with science points would create issues, but we can try to encourage a variety of experiments in exchange for larger science point requirements. I want to spend a series of flights learning all i can about everything in orbit rather than everything that's on the ground when i land. 2. Limited Methods of Research: As noted in the previous point, i think that the range of experiments (at least early on, i've only seen the Goo and Crystal Lab in my save) is too narrow. Perhaps there should be a wider range of 'space-only' experiments to conduct in orbits, as i feel the experiment system is too generalized to encourage an avid exploration of each frontier. Some might complain that flights would get repetitive, but i contrast by saying that a space program ought to be a journey rather than a 3 flight rush to the Mun if you are in Career mode; if you want that kind of gameplay, play in sandbox mode, as you likely aren't interested in science either. I saw another thread discussing whether or not the Career mode was too 'fast,' that player was likely forced to rush to the pace due to the lack of science in orbit. It can leave 'pitfalls' in science where i can't get to the Mun, and i must exhaust science on Kerbin to get parts to get there, or when i can't reach interplanetary missions but have exhausted most of the science on Kerbin, the Mun, and minimus. So, i think we should have a wealth of experiments to choose from, mapping, more encouragement of late-tech satellite play, perhaps a comms relay. Maybe we can build Science stations that generate a slow but steady Research rate via a Science Lab onboard. We can leave behind what experiments we don't want, and move forward with our campaign. 3. Need for a Diversity of Experiments: This is a subpoint of the above, as i note that each experimental module is sort of a one-trick pony kind of deal. I think we should have variety of assignments to give our Kerbals in science, perhaps involve them more in it personally. I'd love to see something akin to the crew system where we can load science bays up with certain experiments just like we can elect crew members for a mission, where the experiments you can take aboard are based on what science modules you've equipped, and the you can unlock new experiments as you progress in overall tech level. For example, if i'm carrying the Science Jr., rather than just studying crystal growth of one arbitrary crystal type, we might be able to test different kinds of crystals, or study how other materials react in space, or even look into how other organisms (like that little octopus in the .22 trailer) react in space. That would brighten up the science aspect and encourage players to build spaceships around new experiments that they want to conduct, rather than making ships solely on reaching the next destination where their 'one trick pony' can repeat itself for a different result due to the change in enviornment. Cheers everyone, and i'd love any feedback points you can offer. I know that my career hasn't advanced far enough to definitvely determine if any of these points are dissuaded, but i'd like to know if they are at some point later than where i'm at. Thanks to Squad in advance for paying attention to the community, and for being open to players' opinions of your product. Please continue your development, as we can only make Science better.

False. I come here often when i'm not on a mission or whilst in the middle of designing an new craft. The user below did not use a solid rocket booster for an entire version of KSP.

Banned for using offensive language: "noob" - in a post directed at another user.

The Beatles. When i say the letter Y, what comes to mind?

It's a little abstract for my taste with just this trailer, but i like the concept. I must say Czo, i'm finding it hard to associate you as an anime fan, but i don't doubt your word on it (Ghost In the Shell is an astounding anime, i must agree). The hyper realism of the program in the anime is salivating, but they need character development not only in the scientists, but also in the spacecraft. Can't wait to see what they come up with for that.

I think you made the right decision. Immersion is part of the experience, and if you just land to 'get the points' and 'win the game' while displeasing yourself for being a murderer, then you aren't enjoying the game - you're a slave to its mechanics. Half the fun in KSP, i've found, is finding the way to accomplish missions at your pace and style, engineering a mission to fufill lofty goals and daunting challenges. Therefore, you should follow what gets you the best results in your mind, and get a fufilling experience with the program. Plus, the game encourages survivability, as you can transmit back EVA reports for 1/2 the science, but if you bring the Kerbal (and the capsule, of course) back alive, you get all of the science. That mechanic was created to penalize the 'one-way landers,' and encourage creativity to make round trip missions. But for those of you that believe Kerbals come plopping out of your cloning vats faster than Jeb can say "SRB!," there's a certain light humor value in stranding your Kerbals *cough* Danny2462 *cough*, so i won't say it's flat out wrong to do the one-way trip.

Wow... 0.12. That was the version when we added the Mun... At that point, i was just orbiting, figuring out how the NavBall worked, and seeing what i could do with the 1m parts. An orbit was quite an achievement for me, and there weren't any maneuver nodes to help me when i did make orbit! All my flying was by the seat of my pants. But with 0.13, i discovered two little modpacks on the forums called the C7 mod and the Novapunch pack, respectively. That transformed my KSP experience, and within the month or so, i used the Novapunch lander to make my first ever Mun landing. That was a magical moment. I continued with planes, or at least what were planes before the SPH. You had to launch them vertically on the launchpad, and the 'jet' engines had about the same Isp as a rocket engine (but that was even before Isp stats!). Here's one of my best, the RX-4L, with some weapons from JellyCubes' Advanced Weapons Research Division: It was a beast to fly, even on SAS (making it a horrible weapons platform), had an appaling fuel range, and it landed on skids. But i loved it, and it became my favorite aircraft until about 0.16, when i stopped updating C7 and the RX-4 with it.