The Jool 500 Kolonization Challenge Continuation for 1.9

[tosha 78]

You know, why the heck not? I'll try this

[jinnantonix 519]

My Jool 500 Mission continues.  20 live Kerbals on Laythe in a fully sustainable base, with outposts for 200 occupants on Laythe and Pol.  CPU is stretched...

[jinnantonix 519]

I am running into trouble with sending Kerbals to Jool using DeepFreeze.  The process of hiring Kerbals, and then freezing them, is killing my CPU.  Any more than about 50 Kerbals in the game, and it grinds to halt.  Anyone else seeing this? 

I plan to continue building the colony hardware, with just a few Kerbal engineers to assist with refueling.

[jinnantonix 519]

@JacobJHC I have completed my Sarnus 50 Kolonisation Mission which was fun, but right at the limit of my ability to commit to game time - even with the reduced scope of colonising 50 kerbals, and using my current craft design, it taxed CPU resources significantly.  It makes me wonder if this Jool 500 challenge is viable, and so at present I am planning to abandon my current attempt at my Jool 500 Mission , it just won;t work in it's current state.

I will say, however that it is possible that my craft designs use too many parts, that it is an aspect of the challenge to simplify craft designs to reduce part count by using low part count mods like SSTU Labs and Tweakscale,  - this way it might be possible work this challenge to completion.  I am interested in your views on this.  How open are you to such mods being included?

Sarnus Space Station (science lab).  Also have cryogenic freezing containers for 50 kerbals.  Too many parts?

Edited May 26, 2020 by jinnantonix

[JacobJHC 684]

FYI, this challenge is getting a much needed overhaul in the near future.

[jinnantonix 519]

On 11/8/2020 at 4:31 PM, JacobJHC said:

FYI, this challenge is getting a much needed overhaul in the near future.

Looking forward to it.  Will definitely have another go if I think its feasible to complete.

[JacobJHC 684]

1 hour ago, jinnantonix said:

Looking forward to it.  Will definitely have another go if I think its feasible to complete.

There's a mod that makes hiring kerbals cheaper but they know less. This mod could potentially make the 500 kerbals in total cost 75 million funds, which would be doable. Also I want to tweak some things to be more stock friendly.

[Jetski 495]

I've revisited this challenge a few times in the various stages of its life.  My biggest hurdles seem to be hiring enough Kerbals (although patience and cheating funds can do the trick) and my CPU overloading.  Just the probes/relays for each planet, plus maybe a single self-sustaining 25-Kerbal base seems to be about all my crappy computer can handle.  Pretty much as soon as I switch to a functioning base it bounces off the ground and turns into Kraken shrapnel.  I've been seriously trying to pare down base construction to the bare essentials (decouple and delete anything not 100% required once landed), but no luck I fear.  I've made some cool ships and bases though :)

It's a shame, as I really like the engineering and scale of the challenge.

[JacobJHC 684]

On 11/10/2020 at 4:46 AM, Jetski said:

I've revisited this challenge a few times in the various stages of its life.  My biggest hurdles seem to be hiring enough Kerbals (although patience and cheating funds can do the trick) and my CPU overloading.  Just the probes/relays for each planet, plus maybe a single self-sustaining 25-Kerbal base seems to be about all my crappy computer can handle.  Pretty much as soon as I switch to a functioning base it bounces off the ground and turns into Kraken shrapnel.  I've been seriously trying to pare down base construction to the bare essentials (decouple and delete anything not 100% required once landed), but no luck I fear.  I've made some cool ships and bases though

It's a shame, as I really like the engineering and scale of the challenge.

I'll definitely take this into account when I retool everything. There's a mod I'm looking into called TRP-Hire which makes hiring kerbals significantly cheaper. This should help with the Kerbal hire (which helped end my last attempt at this challenge), as all 500 colonists in theory would cost under 75 million funds, which is totally doable if several large science missions or contracts are completed. If the mod works how I think it will I'll definitely recommend it for all challengers. As for the probes and 25-kerbal bases being your computer's limit along with the probes, I'll take a note from the previous challenge admin and ok the deletion of probes to help with framerate. As long as the relays were in place once, deleting them and disabling com networks would be 100% acceptable. In your case I would also allow you to simply build multiple 25-kerbal outposts if a 50 kerbal base (as required by the challenge) isn't possible on your machine.

If you have any other suggestions on helping to generalize/open up this challenge please do comment it here.

[jinnantonix 519]

1 hour ago, JacobJHC said:

IThere's a mod I'm looking into called TRP-Hire which makes hiring kerbals significantly cheaper. This should help with the Kerbal hire (which helped end my last attempt at this challenge), as all 500 colonists in theory would cost under 75 million funds, which is totally doable if several large science missions or contracts are completed.

My previous attempt at this challenge was in Sandbox mode, so no issues with the cost of hiring Kerbals.  Have I misunderstood a requirement?  Because if it is mandatory to do this in Career mode, then that is definitely beyond my ability to commit to game time.

[JacobJHC 684]

1 minute ago, jinnantonix said:

My previous attempt at this challenge was in Sandbox mode, so no issues with the cost of hiring Kerbals.  Have I misunderstood a requirement?  Because if it is mandatory to do this in Career mode, then that is definitely beyond my ability to commit to game time.

Any gamemode works. The gamemode only effects scoring anyhow. Rest assured it does not put you at a disadvantage whichever one you choose.

[jinnantonix 519]

@JacobJHC here is my proposed mod list.  Any objections?

• USI-LS
• Kerbal Planetary Base System
• SSTU Labs
• SpaceY Heavy Lifters
• NearFuture Electrical
• Tweakscale + Recall
• Kerbal Atomics 
   

• MechJeb 
• Kerbal Engineer
• Kerbal Alarm Clock
• Trajectories

Edit: Adding Kerbal Atomics.

Edited February 19 by jinnantonix

[JacobJHC 684]

On 11/16/2020 at 7:20 PM, jinnantonix said:

@JacobJHC here is my proposed mod list.  Any objections?

• USI-LS
• Kerbal Planetary Base System
• SSTU Labs
• SpaceY Heavy Lifters
• NearFuture Electrical
• Tweakscale

• MechJeb 
• Kerbal Engineer
• Kerbal Alarm Clock
• Trajectories

Sounds good to me. Best of luck!

[jinnantonix 519]

OK, I have my new laptop with i7 CPU and 16GB RAM, and ready to proceed with another attempt at this challenge. 

I will be documenting the mission at Jool 500 Kolonization Mission (Redux)   You can also subscribe to the Jinnantonix Youtube channel

Edited February 18 by jinnantonix

[jinnantonix 519]

Here is part 1 of the mission, assembly of the first 5 transit vehicles in low Kerbin orbit.  The craft have now all burned for Jool.
 

 

[JacobJHC 684]

On 10/28/2016 at 9:49 AM, JacobJHC said:

Each moon, as well as Jool itself, should be explored by machines in advance of sending kerbals. Also, the colony will need a satellite network for communication.

@jinnantonix I eagerly await part 2, just remember to have unmanned exploration done before the colony is constructed. I like your reusable launcher too

 

On 10/28/2016 at 9:49 AM, JacobJHC said:

Launch and land your bases in advance of sending your kerbals.

 

Edited Tuesday at 08:30 PM by JacobJHC

[jinnantonix 519]

On 2/24/2021 at 7:29 AM, JacobJHC said:

@jinnantonix I eagerly await part 2,

Working on it.  I have enough clips  now for about 10 videos, so will have to figure out how trim it down.  I was thinking part 2 would show the whole setup on Laythe, since that is the most interesting, and includes sea outposts and rovers and bases (hydroponic farms).  Could be a very long video, there is a lot to it.  Part 3 might be showing key parts of the setup on Vall, Tylo Pol and Bop.  I will have to leave out the details or it will be an epic.  

Quote

just remember to have unmanned exploration done before the colony is constructed.

Shouldn't be a  problem.  All the hardware for transit 1 is now at their respective moons, and relays in polar and equatorial orbits.  Probes have been landed at each biome, and scanned for resources.  A few outposts have been delivered, but this takes some time as the landing craft need to be refuelled each time.  This requires about 8 days on Laythe and 15 days on Tylo, give or take.  With the exception of Pol and Bop, where only one  refuel is required (due to low gravity), I am staggering the outpost setup across the moons.  It is complicated and Kerbal Alarm Clock is getting plenty of use.

There is an engineer aboard each freighter to run the ISRU refuelling systems.  They spend their time cooped up in a lander can although it is feasible that they could transfer into an outpost for a bit of R&R, I haven't done it in game play .  At the end of the transit 1 phase, when all the moons are fully explored and outposts setup, I plan for engineers to occupy  an outpost.  I believe that satisfies the above rule.
 

Quote

I like your reusable launcher too

Thanks.  Made mostly of SpaceY parts and a bit of Tweakscale to make everything huge. 

Edited 5 hours ago by jinnantonix

[jinnantonix 519]

Delivering an outpost to Vall.  The rover is dropped to the surface, and moves away.  The outpost is lowered and dropped to the surface.  The freighter is then refuelled and returns to polar orbit to rendezvous with the outpost hub. 

The Laythe Freighter orbital rendezvous with the outpost hub.  The land outposts are landed with the freighter, dropping the rover before lowering the outpost to the surface.  The sea outposts are dropped from orbit, and use chutes to decelerate prior to splash down.

 

Edited 9 hours ago by jinnantonix