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The KSP forum moderator's team presents the Threads of the Month August 2021 Edition Hello and greetings to all! It's already August and the first day of the month always means it's time for the next edition of The Thread of the Month! July was a busy month for many of us and August appears to be heading in a similar direction - busy and full of its share of challenges. For many of us, it seems that COVID-19 has become a never-ending exercise in guessing what the next recommendation from health officials will be. There's been some unique challenges for all of us and each challenge always creates even more anxiety, frustration, and at times, anger with this drama that continues to unfold. The good news is you don't need to wear a mask to play Kerbal Space Program. Although Kermen can catch a bad case of stupidity, they are immune to COVID-19! And unless you are using a public WiFi connection or other public location, you don't have to wear a mask to access the forum, either! To continue a thing I started in May (2021) about the forum and new members as a way to answer the fears some folks had about the forum dying. In July, there were 480 new forum accounts created. Of those, 215 have actively posted content (defined as having at least one post). This means that roughly 44.8% of the new user accounts are actively participating on the forum. If you're interested in seeing the new members to our forum, you can click here! So, before I get into the threads of the month for August, I ask that as you visit the forum this month, you help make it easier for me to do the September Thread of the Month and nominate worthy threads by using the handy instructions at the bottom of this post. Now, without further delay, I present to you the threads of the month for August: General community threads of the month: This category features a thread that adds to the community and doesn't fit in the game support/game mod categories. This month, we have two threads recognized for this category: One of the things that always has fueled the imagination of the armchair astronaut, astronomer, and lover of science -fiction are the possibilities of what humans can do in space. Terraforming other worlds has long been a goal of humankind since spacecraft began to orbit the distant worlds within our Solar System. For generations, the idea of transforming Venus has gone from being a fanciful idea of science-fiction to being considered by various space agencies around the world. While we certainly lack the ability to do so now, the debate about what could happen in the future is still something often discussed. In this thread, @sh1pman begins the discussion on the forum we've all been a part of at some point in the past. Okay, let's all admit it. We all have our favorite "go to" aircraft we look to for inspiration. For me, there are a variety of aircraft and it is hard to limit me to just one favorite. But that's just what this thread by @Ben J. Kerman asks us to do - to pick your favorite plane/helicopter! If you go through the thread, you'll notice a lot of us have either long entries featuring a variety of craft OR a few posts highlighting multiple vehicles. If you haven't shared you favorite helicopter or aircraft on this thread, why not? It's a great way to start conversations and meet a variety of forum members. Game Support/Game Mod of the Month: This category features a mod (or mods) which adds to the quality of life game play of Kerbal Space Program. For June, we have one thread in this category: Ever want more destinations for your Kerbalnauts to explore? @Zaffre has heard your cries for "moar!" and given you a new and developing solar system to explore. The introduction to the mod sums it up pretty well: "This pack adds a whole new high-quality star system, Polaris, for you to explore, situated directly above the home system at 4.3 kerbal light years! The system is based on Polaris, but also has inspiration from WASP-12, Mu Arae, and our own Sol. It primarily adds giant planets and their satellites, with more to come in the future. " So, if you're looking to explore some strange, new work, to seek out new life forms and civilizations. to boldly go... Wait, the description also says "Sorry Star Trek fans! This isn’t a Trek-themed pack." Forum Member Created Challenges and Missions: This is a new category we are adding to the Threads of the Month. For the past few years, we have seen a lot of really good missions and challenges threads created that expand our fun with the game and presses our skills, creativity, and sometimes, luck, beyond what we get accustomed to. Let's face it, we all have our go-to design basics, our go-to Kermen, and even our go-to vehicles we like to use. So sometimes a good challenge can cause us to think of another way to achieve our goals. Unfortunately, we did not have any nominations for this category. Fan-fiction, Mission Reports, and Kerbal Space Program-inspired Creative Thread of the Month: This category features a thread (or threads) which while is not directly Kerbal Space Program related, may be a creative work, fan-fiction, or other presentation which is related to the game. For this month, we have one thread in this cagegory. There is a lot of real-life inspiration for how many players enjoy Kerbal Space Program. For me, it is always exciting to see what inspiration others use for their games. The introduction by @Kuiper_Belt says it all: The International Space Station is one of humanities greatest achievements. Like many others I love the ISS, mods and Kerbal Space Program, naturally you would mix all 3. A little over a year ago I began an endeavor to accurately construct the ISS in order and document it on reddit. Since then time has passed and I have vastly improved in my ship creation and screenshot taking skills. I knew when I stopped the first time I'd revisit the idea and now is the time! The goal of this whole thing is to use Kerbal Space Program and a vast library of mods to document every flight to the ISS and its construction in order. In all fairness, this is a joint effort of @Kuiper_Belt and @lemon cup. Both of them have done a great job in recreating the missions of the International Space Station within the confines of the Kerbal Space Program! If you are looking for some real-life inspiration for your game or you just want to see some really good screen shots, then this is a thread worth checking out! Honorable mentions: Each month we get so many good nominations to choose from. Sometimes it's a challenge to choose which threads are going to receive the honor of being the Thread of the Month. But because not every thread nominated each month can be selected, there are always those that become honorable mentions. The honorable mentions for August 2021 are: [1.8.1/1.10.1] Katniss's Cape Canaveral - RSS submitted by @Katniss218 My first manned Eve Mission (with return) submitted by @IvanBatura The birthday thread! submitted by @Souptime What is your favorite way to play KSP? submitted by @Hyperspace Industries Honorable mentions for August may not have made the Thread of The Month this month, but if you think they might be worthy of another opportunity, please renominate it! Congratulations to all the winners of the Thread of the Month for August! We'd like to thank @AlamoVampire, @Spaceman.Spiff, @Dientus, @Kuiper_Belt, @Stormpilot, @The Doodling Astronaut, and the members of the moderation team who nominated this month's contenders. Thank you so much for helping us identify noteworthy threads for this month! TO NOMINATE A THREAD FOR CONSIDERATION: If you find a thread you feel should be considered for next month's thread of the month, then use the "report comment" feature (the three dots on the upper right corner of the comment box) to report the comment. Please put in the text field of the report post "Nomination for thread of the month" and we will do the rest! You can always nominate more than one thread, too. In case you missed July's threads of the month, you can click here.

The Idea: The International Space Station is one of humanities greatest achievements. Like many others I love the ISS, mods and Kerbal Space Program, naturally you would mix all 3. A little over a year ago I began an endeavor to accurately construct the ISS in order and document it on reddit. Since then time has passed and I have vastly improved in my ship creation and screenshot taking skills. I knew when I stopped the first time I'd revisit the idea and now is the time! The goal of this whole thing is to use Kerbal Space Program and a vast library of mods to document every flight to the ISS and its construction in order. Myself@lemon cup and @D0m1nu2 work hard on this project and we're very excited to work on documenting the sheer greatness that surrounds the ISS and it's missions! My Inspiration: The idea isn't original and born of several things including another series I created focusing on Shuttle Missions called Shuttle Adventures! These missions are created by not only myself but other like minded Kerbal players. But the Idea isn't mine by any means and I feel inclined to credit those who inspired me, If you like anything I've done you'll certainly enjoy what they've done. @Jay The Amazing Toaster with Kānāwai: Ares to Mars Kevin Gustafson and his amazing among other things ISS & Mir documentaries on Youtube @winged and his amazing among other things Constellation Mars video @Zorg @alberro+and @Pioneer_Stevefor dazzling me with their magnificent screenshots @AmateurAstronaut1969 and their fantastic series on the ETS Space Station Freedom @Jacktical and their awesome series on the IRL concept of Space Station Freedom that goes by the name of Space Station Liberty @D0m1nu2 and their excellent International Manned Laboratory series, a recreation of International Skylab conducted in RSS! @Aviation365 and their wonderful series Go At Throttle Up, an RSS/RO depiction of Shuttle Flights both real and fictional, while obeying Shuttle parameters. The progenitor to this series, Shuttle Adventures, An Album of Kerbalized Space Shuttle Missions, containing real, proposed, canceled and other Shuttle related missions. You can find that here: Mods: Since the inception of Shuttle Adventures the mod list has grown slowly over time and I've tried to keep up with updating the mod list. that will be include in the spoiler below the list of highlighted mods. @benjee10 With Redirect, Habtech 2, and SOCK @DylanSemrau With Photon Corp @Beale With Tantares @tony48 With KSRSS & KSRSSVE And the ReStock team with of course Restock Thanks to those who interact and follow this series! We've been working hard and having a great time making it!

Cooling Venus with enormous space mirrors sounds crazy and awesome. Terraforming also requires some speculative technologies like space tethers, mass drivers and mining of Mercury and Europa for materials. What do you think, does this plan look good? I see some minor issues with the way it was laid out in the video, though. For example, they suggest removing CO2 ice from frozen Venus using mass drivers, forgetting that there’s still a 3 bar nitrogen atmosphere left. Firing a mass driver in a 3 bar atmosphere will probably cause spectacular fireworks and explosions. Also, do you believe that humanity can actually commit to a thousand-year project like this, that won’t be of any economic benefit and will cost a tremendous amount of money, without some kind of authoritarian political will?

Overview After over 2 years of improving and learning, hopefully it is worth the wait to those who watched along the way. I started this project as an innocent curiosity, then a personal project that meant something to me. I wanted to set this one apart from the majority of planet mods. I wanted this to be good; as good as I could make it, and did the best I could with my lil' Macbook; with TextEdit and GIMP. I’ll see to even better as updates come. I hope you all enjoy what I have to share! This pack adds a whole new high-quality star system, Polaris, for you to explore, situated directly above the home system at 4.3 kerbal light years! The system is based on Polaris, but also has inspiration from WASP-12, Mu Arae, and our own Sol. It primarily adds giant planets and their satellites, with more to come in the future. The objects feature various scatters on their surfaces, so they’re not so barren! No pre-1.8 terrain shader either. For those with lower end computers, don’t worry! You won’t need visual mods to see wonderful worlds. I’ve designed it partly with no visuals in mind, but it’ll look even better with them! If Kopernicus Expansion is installed, wormholes will appear that can take you to and fro! SCIENCE NOTE: This is not a fully realistic recreation of the real Polaris System. The real system is quite young, has no detected planets so far, and the outermost star is an F-type, not an Alpha Centauri A analogue. Sorry Star Trek fans! This isn’t a Trek-themed pack. Celestial body list Delta-V map courtesy of @WarriorSabe! Gallery Thanks to @Clonosand @ballisticfox0for taking these wonderful pictures! Required mods --Being a mod that adds celestial bodies, it requires Kopernicus and its own prerequisites. Recommended/Optional mods --Arthur's TiltUnlocker will make Gyro sit on its side! Beware: You may run into some bugs with this. One such is its misbehavior with scatterer. --If you want to take a way of getting there that's less of a hassle, try wormholes with Kopernicus Expansion Continued-er! So far I have the stock system (and by extension JNSQ), Beyond Home, Whirligig World, GPP, Alternis Kerbol Rekerjiggered, and GEP primary. --If you want to get there the old fashioned way, I recommend Blueshift, KSPIE, or Far Future Technologies with Calvin's buffed ISP patch. Oh, and Better Timewarp for your convenience. --If you want a nice home that meshes well with this system, try Beyond Home. If you want to give the lone Polaris system some friends, you cannot go wrong with Extrasolar and Galaxies Unbound. Regarding errors If you encounter a problem, provide a snapshot of your GameData and your logs. I can't help you if I don't know what is wrong! See this thread on how: Mod Support —EVE —Scatterer —Sigma loading screens —DOE —Research Bodies —Sigma Dimensions —Most planet mods. Being a mod that adds a whole separate star system, it does not intrude upon any system replacers, system accessories, or other system adders. Download Github Spacedock Being a first mod and first release of said mod, there might be issues. So just report them and bear with me. FAQ -Is there a way to make the system closer? Yes! There is an optional patch I've included to make the distance 10 times closer than normal -I switched back to the KSC and everything looks all glitchy! What can I do!? The KSC will appear all wonky and glitchy if you switch back to it from a long distance. A simple scene change, like going into the VAB and then back, will fix it! -Is this a system replacer? What's the homeworld? This is not a system replacer, but instead a system adder. There are rough plans for a homeswitch in the distant future. Discord It is not my home server, but you can contact me and say hello on the Kopernicus Discord server! https://discord.gg/XmVp23s Changelog Credits @Exo's Lab - For being an all around wonderful person and very supportive of my endeavor. Seriously, thanks a ton. @WarriorSabe - For extra support, remembering lotsa useful things, being a major science wiz, and dropping in logical input. Also thanks for new planet flares! @GregroxMun - For his amazing star tutorial and making me feel at home in the planet modding community shortly after I joined. @Adstri - For inspiration, support, and camaraderie. @SnailsAttack - Supplied useful references and resources in the creation of this mod. Also gave a few pointers. @TheGhastModding - Helped create Oceanus' initial texture. @OhioBob - For being an all around great guy, providing documentation, and helping out with temperatures/atmospheres. @StarCrusher96 - For occasional pointers, interest, support, and being one of my sources of inspiration! @Caps Lock - He was kind enough to provide me the new sunflares! @wby123 - Supplied the Chinese translation! @Clonos - Great support, nice shots, and hunting bugs! @ballisticfox0 - For taking great shots and helping find problems for me to iron out! @R-T-B - For keeping Kopernicus alive and keeping the line of communication open! @Vabien - For keeping Kopernicus Expansion alive! @Snark - For answering questions about the forum! @Arekva- For making the glorious TiltUnlocker mod! License Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Public License If for some reason this has become dead or I've gone inactive/left or whatever, go ahead and remind me to look at P.S. I'm a sucker for big ol' spaceships! So send pics of your starships! Not spacex starships, ew. I require true starships!