NephilimNexus

It's not that use of power that irks me; rather is that batteries and solar panels are placed so far up the tech tree. You're basically stuck with the one-kerbal pod and it's one-shot power supply for far, far too long in the game. IMHO, they should move the basic, non-movable flatscreen solar panel to within the first or second tier at least, along with the smallest battery. Something to let us be able to get out more than one transmission before the battery dies. Yes, yes, I know that running the engine can recharge your battery, but that takes precious fuel and has a habit of wrecking that perfect orbit we worked so hard to achieve.

But now I wonder if there is any loss/gain of total points when comparing transmission to delivery by hand?

I can't really be sure from the picture, but are all of your engines perfectly level with each other? With so many on there it would be easy for a uneven engine placement to slip past. Even a tiny imbalance in thrust can grow exponentially into a complete spinout very, very quickly.

Correct! Probes get more science the farther away from Kerbin you are. Personally, I just made a basic unmanned probe, slapped a couple of mystery goo containers to the side and launched it clean out of the solar system. Every few weeks (game time) I go back to check on it and rake in more free science points.