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Introduction to myself and my space program.


Raticon

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Hello everyone! Beware of a very long post!

As you can see my nickname is Raticon, i'm 25 years old and live in northern Sweden, deep in the woods. I have always had a big interest in space and space exploration in general, but the Soviet space program in particular. Why? First and foremost i think their craft looks more remniscent of '60s Sci-Fi movies and got some touches from "The world of tomorrow", i might have a slight political bias too... :wink: but in general i have always seen space exploration as the achievments of mankind as a whole and not any particular ideology or nation, regardless of what the nation itself think about it. Gagarins orbit and the footprints left on the moon by Aldrin and Armstrong is all a part of of history and hopefully a future where cooperation is the guiding principle instead of competition.

As a space-nut i have always sought after good space-themed games. Be they realistic simulations, action packed space combat arcade or massive strategy-games i have almost everytime found a liking to some particular aspect of the game but disregarded the simplicity of it all. Don't get me wrong, i know a game has to be user friendly to attract new players but i think that games with focus on space are too simple.

Spaceflight in most games are simple Starlancer & Freelancer-style "point with your mouse and hold W to go to warp speed" or "mount this giant laz0r bigger than your ship and blast some worlds to pieces, then hold W to go to hyper-warp". I had huge hopes for the space-part of the game "Spore", and in my fantasy i saw carefully assembled landers and calculated orbits as my crew of frog-eyed purple tripedals descended trough the atmosphere to meet aliens or collect samples. The dissapointment hit me in the skull like a sledge when i simply rolled the mousewheel and clicked somewhere and in 5 seconds i was orbiting some volcanic world in a distant system and got hit by huge rocks ejected from lava-geysers on the world, taking away 1 hitpoint out of 700 of my ship... Endless Space seemed like a good strategy-game that started out small and "primitive" and ended in warp travel, wormholes and whatnot. I tried it out but i became frustrated about the fact that it's bacially a take on all the other similar games in the genre: Space Empires, Galactic Cililizations, Masters of orion and all those. I don't mean to disrespect these games and those who makes them, but i really think that they need some revitalization to the genre, it becomes a gray matter of repetitiveness and

Frustration. Anger. Tears (almost). ALT-F4 spammed and games deleted. In this disgruntled mood i searched the web for simple queries. "Space simulation" "Space exploration game" and so forth, until i one day stumbled across a simulation most of you are familiar with, i suppose: Orbiter, the god of...well, orbits and physics i guess :cool:.

I fired it up as soon as i got it home and tried it out, anticipation was on the top after viewing Timm Humphreys Orbiter video about a Soviet Lunar landing. At first i couldn't get off the launchpad. Once i sorted that matter out i had a hard time getting into anything that with even a kind mind could be called Low earth orbit. I downloaded a couple of mods and started hanging on the forums, learned the basics of calculations related and dusted off my calculator to try them out with mixed success. That was a long time ago and i am now quite capable of recreating simple missions like Vostok 1 and Sputnik as the Interkosmos-nut i am :D.

One day people was starting to talk about some new game on the Orbiter forums, "kerbal space program" and most players seemed to like it, some were less enthusiastic, as was i to be honest. I took a quick look at it and though "Bah! Too simple, a kids game with phony physics!" :sticktongue:. But more and more youtube-videos got me fired up and the game progressed fast. Especially Kurtjmac's videos on Youtube got me excited and got me laughing lots of times. I though that "if Kurt, who's quite the adept gamer fails at this and his rockets, shuttles and silly constructions break up like lego and tumbles violently into space and into the earth again, it must be a good game!" so i downloaded the demo and had both tears and laughter. But i wanted more, watching all those videos and reading all those stories about 0.16 and all it's splendor and features and the upcoming 0.17 version made me buy the game.

Im addicted like crazy now. Hooked to the game in such a bad way that it has dominated my mind for the last weeks or so. As i work in 7-day workshifts far away from home with a 7-day free time in between the shifts you can guess how many mad plans i have drawn up on my weeks away from home. Munar landings, Minmus transfer orbits and building a decent rocket which won't explode on the pad or break up in the upper atmosphere is all challenges that almost reach out and grabs Orbiter by the tail, and does a great job of making it both fun and interesting in the same move.

Squad, you have made the ultimate game for me. It's fun, it's difficult and spaceflight and orbits now require calculations, timed burns and a lot of nailbiting and prayer to not make you crash or making you that famous pile of broken up lego in orbit. You, with this masterpiece strayed away from the gray flock of games and simulations that have degenerated spaceflight into simple point-and-hold-button type of games where everything happens by the whims of the AI, you boldly ventured where no man has gone before (pun intended) and made me the game of my dreams. Noone will ever see a product like this come from one of the bigger "houses" as it has too few aliens, too little laserbeams and you actually have to use your brain and some math to make that flight.

You rule! Thank you!

Accomplishments!

Here's two pictures of my most recent accomplishments. It took me two weeks to accomplish them and countless of designs. I will post a pic of my Minmus rocket later on. I have not used any mods or Mechjeb at all during my program as i like to keep it stock. In a streak of egocentricity i named all my earlier crafts to something beginning with "Rat" and ending with something taken from the Soviet array of crafts, Soyuz, Zond, Vostok and those. Hence, the lunar orbiter i made before the landing attempt was dubbed "Ratzond", and was basically this craft except the landing legs and with a bigger engine. The rocket for this lander is therefore named "Ratyuz" and the lander is the one thing that broke the naming conventions and traditions and, somewhat disturbingly, performed best of all crafts. I will present a full list of my space program so far in a separate post below, if that's appropriate :).

Lander: the "Munik", a homage to the Mun and Sputnik who celebrates 55 years this very year! It's a rather simple design in my eyes but it took me down safely to Minmus in my first and only attempt so far and the Mun in 2 out of 5 attempts! I know that lander isn't perfect, especially not with those wings attached to the top which creates a lot of drag and instability, they are there mostly for show as landers without them tend to look rather silly and.... phallic? :sealed:. As for the RCS-thrusters i completely forgot to load fuel for them, so they are mounted just for show too.

Kerbonaut: In both cases it was Jebediah Kerman who single-handedly made the liftoff, maneuvering, landing and return mission with success. He only paniked a few times, especially during Minar and Minmus retroburns...

Munar landing:

http://imgur.com/a/4nSdZ#0

4nSdZ#0

Minmus landing:

http://imgur.com/a/4nSdZ#1

4nSdZ#1

Seems to be a problem with linking pictures directly, so i give you two URL's instead.

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Thank you Capt'n Skunky, may your own launches be successful and your boosters never overheat!

The Raticonian program!

Hello!

As i stated in my earlier post i wanted to do a presentation of my program to show you where i am and hopefully get some input from you wise folks. The program has been running for about 1 week of effective time and 1 week of planning and sketching time. I use no mods in my game as of yet, not even MechJeb because i want to do stuff myself and get a grip of things. But i do suffer from a lack of Rovers and will give those a shot soon with Tosh's rover appealing to me the most.

The naming conventions and my affinity for standard designs need some explanation as in my above post. In a streak of egocentricity i dubbed all my rockets and systems something that molded together "Rat" or "Ra" and then something from the Soviet program, which fascinates me very much. Thus, the rocket system that carries my landers and pods to orbit, the mun and beyond is named "Ratyuz" with 1, 2 and 3 denominating the numbers of stages and complexity involved. thus, Ratyuz 1 would be 1 stage w/ boosters for simple orbiting op's and taking minimalistic pods and such to orbit. Ratyuz 2 would be a medium sized rocket with 2 stages + boosters with the second stage consisting of 6 stacks of liquid tanks + rockets circulating the inner one by radial decouplers totalling 7 rockets with the outer 6 decoupling in orbit and the center stage carrying me to the mun, as i discovered like many others that long stacks are unwieldy. Ratyuz 3 is my Minmus-and-beyond system consisting basiacally of another Ratyuz 2 mounted atop of the first Ratyuz 2 stack totalling... a lot of rockets and awkward staging procedures. This is the system that has caused me most headache... I suck at explanation without pics...:confused:

Onward to the program!

I have so far used only the smaller mk.1 pod and smaller fuel tanks + engines as i seem to have problems with the big rockets exploding on the pad... if nothing else is stated decouplers, parachutes, winglets and other stuff is included as standard and not listed :).

1. "Rastock" Orbit program

Mission: Achieve basic, stable orbit around Kerbin and return safely.

Equipment: Basic Ratyuz 1 rocket with small command module for deorbit burn.

  • Rastock 1 - Failed to achieve orbit and crashed into the sea. Increased number of boosters for Rastock 2.
  • Rastock 2 - Failed to achieve orbit. Exploded in mid air due to excessive amounts of boosters... :blush:
  • Rastock 3 - Mission accomplished!. Craft entered an eccentric orbit of 75k x 120k and made a successful splashdown near KSC after 2 orbits.
  • Rastock 4, 5 & 6 - Successful followups to learn more advanced orbiting procedures and get more stable orbits. Rastock 6 was a polar orbiter.

2. "Ratzond" Munar orbit program

Mission: Achieve basic, stable orbit around Kerbin, then burn for the Mun, achieve orbit and return safely.

Equipment: Ratyuz 2 rocket with munar lander/orbiter prototype "Ratzond" without landing struts attached.

  • Ratzond 1 - Failed to achieve orbit around Minmus because of unstable rocket system wobbling out of control in upper atmo.
  • Ratzond 2 - Mission accomplished! Munar injection and orbit was a stunning success no-one anticipated. Returntrip was awkward but worked.
  • Ratzond 3 - Repetition of the successful Ratzond 2 with more practice on munar return and lower munar orbits.

3. "Munik" Munar landing program, a.k.a "the big bad one".

Mission: Achieve basic, stable orbit around Kerbin, then burn for the Mun, achieve munar orbit, land, perform EVA and get home safely.

Equipment: Ratyuz 2 rocket with munar lander prototype "Munik" with 4 or 6 landing struts attached depending on model.

  • Munik 1 & 2 - Failed to achieve munar orbit due to miscalculated munar insertions. Some scientists fired after this one.
  • Munik 3 - Failed disastrously! Lander impacted the mun at ~350m/s and was utterly destroyed. 1 Kerbonaut killed and many scientists fired.
  • Munik 4 - Horrible failure! Munar landing successful. Burn for munar return orbit failed and lander crashed into the Mun due to too little fuel. 1 Kerbonaut killed. A lot of scientists fired as usual.
  • Munik 5 - "Oh the humanity!" type of failure! Lander made Munar impact at a shocking ~500m/s and 1 Kerbonaut was disintegrated. Hundreds of scientists sentenced to death by firing squad.
  • Munik 6, 7, 8 & 9 - Practice missions with different rockets. All failed epically and decision was made to stick with original configuration despite the horrible losses of life and thousands of sacked scientists.
  • Munik 10 - Mission accomplished! And there was much rejoicing. Violent return into Kerbin atmosphere due to miscalculated return insertion ended well. No scientists fired. Jebediah becomes hero.
  • Munik 11 & 12 - Successful repetitions of Munik 10. Return trip went safely this time and some scientists were re-hired.

4. "Minzond" Minmus orbit program.

Mission: Achieve basic, stable orbit around Minmus and get home safely.

Equipment: Ratyuz 3 rocket with modified Munar/Minmus lander "Munik" with 6 landing struts attached. Jebediah "The Hero" Kerman as pilot, commander, engineer and general hero of the mission.

  • Minzond 1 - Near disaster! The powerful Ratyuz 3 rocket almost sent Jebediah out to Kerbocentric orbit. Craft barely made the trip home again. A few scientists jailed, many fired.
  • Minzond 2 - Mission success! Minmus polar orbit achieved, many pictures of the icy world was taken by Jeb and the return trip was safe.

5. "Minnik" Minmus landing program.

Mission: Achieve landing and EVA on Minmus and get home safely.

Equipment: Ratyuz 3 rocket with modified Munar/Minmus lander "Munik" with 6 landing struts attached. Jebediah "The Hero" Kerman as pilot, commander, engineer, ice-cream vendor and boss.

  • Minnik 1 - Mission success! Minmus landing went smooth and safely. Jeb ate a lot of the snow on Minmus and became sick, which almost got him killed on the return trip.

6. "Raturan" Spaceplane/Shuttle program.

Mission: Build a safe, working Shuttle/Spaceplane capable of low Kerbin orbit and safe return

Equipment: *Currently planning and building a completely new concept based on hitherto unknown concepts...*

  • Raturan 1 - *Not yet launched*

Conclusions so far: The Ratyuz 2 rocket system needs some work done as it is clear that it is highly unstable and underpowered for even Munar missions. Ratyuz 3 is much more capable but overly complex and expensive for munar missions. Work must continue to ensure a better system for Munar missions. The "Raturan" shuttle-program is underway and the results are going to be interesting. Jailed scientists will be released on bail and fired scientists will be offered new jobs in the program as janitors, candy vendors and cooks.

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Wow! already made it to the mun and minmus! Congrats!

Also, I totally agree on your third paragraph of the first post. Most space-themed games either insult our intellegence, or are impossible for a normal user to.. use. I agree that KSP has been the first to find teh middle ground between realism and fun. Rarely, on ANY game, do I say that. More props out to the sqaud dev *and* community teams. Some great minds, and great people out there.

I also tried orbiter. This is how it went: Launch game. Look at earth. click mouse buttons. click keyboard buttons. close. :P I could've given it another chance, but if they don't even have a title screen, I don't know why I'd play the rest.... On second thought, It might've just been loading... uhhhh, might want to try it again now!

For your ships, I'd say nice move on using stock parts. Mods are great for opening up new types of spacecraft, and (of course) more parts to mess with. IMO It's best to be creative with the stock parts first. Using mods to get to the mun gives *way* less satisfaction after an achievement (such as landing on minmus).

Some pointers for your spacecraft: avoid fins on your lander (unless you like the look of them :P). They add weight, and actually a bit of unstability. As of now, drag is only partially implemented. So a fuel tank added to the side of your ship adds a bit of overall drag your ship, but inline fuel tanks add the same amount. So, as of now, the best way to do staging is by adding each new stage radially. I usually add fuel lines from outer stages to inner ones, so only the outer tanks are being drained, but every engine is firing, all the time. (If you're up to it, calculate the F/W ratio. Around 2.0 is best for sea level). You can find theads with complicated math in the "challenges" section of the forums. There are many more forum users that are *much* better than I am at that kind of stuff.

Also, try not to get too attached to a certain ship. With the constant updates, you are likely to need to re-create your ships, due to saave files changing and new parts replacing old ones, and stuff like that. Best way to do it is to just keep making ship after ship; give them simple descriptive names. You'll still want to save them, though. I had a ship that launched fine, but simply exploded once it got to a certain altitude. Saved it as "time bomb" and started from scratch again. Later, I found out what part causes a lot of problems. (large in-line decoupler). I I edited the time bomb to re-enforce that part, and it works great as a lunar lander now!

Anyway, hope you have lots of fun in the future, and as Capt'n skynky said: Happy launching!

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Thank you Newt.

I took your advice and modified my lander and rocket a bit by removing those fins from the top and placing them at the bottom with the booster rockets. The ascent phase is a bit less dramatic now :). My rocket had the radial-liquid fuel rocket system like you described but i hadn't toyed around with fuel lines and the centre stage firing with the radial ones yet, so i pulled some fuel lines from the outer 6 stages to the centre stage and set the centre engine to fire simultaneously as the radial ones. Works like a charm and that little extra bit of thrust i get saves me some fuel once i get into orbit. The rocket still needs some work as it has a tendency to start tipping over and wobble insanely due to the slightest adjustment in trajectory before hitting 30km up.

I have also, quite tearfully and dramatically loosened my grip on my beloved standardized systems and begun planning for the future, a future when i actually have to adapt to changing situations and new updates.

Yeah, Orbiter has a very clumsy interface and no map like KSP has, making orbital corrections very difficult as in stock. But there are some really nice mods and tips to get you started.

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