[MISSION] Jool Mix-Up

[Superfluous J]

DOWNLOAD:

On KerbalX - Jool Mix-Up

On Steam - Jool Mix-Up

IN SHORT:

This mission/challenge is all about navigating the Jool system with only the level of control afforded when you are out of comms range. That's right: no keyboard aiming, no maneuver nodes, no fine-tuned thrust. Pol and Bop won't be too much trouble. Vall could be a challenge. Tylo might be just too much for you. And what about Laythe? Seriously? I you expect me to fly a plane with the "radial out" button?

Yes. Yes I do.

BRIEFING:

This is a PR nightmare!

Jeb landed the Bop lander on Pol, the Vall lander on Bop, the Tylo lander on Vall, and the Laythe lander on Tylo! And he didn't realize it until he was getting ready to land the Pol lander on Laythe!

You have to fix this. You're our only hope.

Oh, and none of the landers have full control, so you'll have to do it blind.

Oh, and the only lander we have ANY control of at all is the Bop lander. You won't be able to control any other lander until you're close enough to it and landed.

Good luck!

MODS:

No required mods, but I highly recommend a time warp mod and Kerbal Alarm Clock. Don't use MechJeb or anything else that helps you control the ship, as this mission is all about having very little control. I would suggest not even installing Kerbal Engineer so you don't even know things like how far off the ground you are.

DISCLAIMER

While I'm not sure what will happen when you either don't win or try to trick it, but if you just play it you'll be fine. If odd things happen, let me know either here or via PM. Also, I'm still learning this whole Mission thing so bear that in mind.

THE REST:

I got this idea when I lost my relay to an unfortunate encounter with Tylo, and I wanted to say I'd landed on Bop. The only ship I had that could do it was on Pol and didn't have comms.

I've beaten this mission in its current state. I learned a lot about controlling the uncontrollable, and hope you will too. I also hope you will find it as fun as I did.

 

Edited July 21, 2018 by 5thHorseman
Changed link on KerbalX and Steam because neither is "updating" they're just adding new missions.

[HansonKerman]

 Wow. Definitely gonna try this out.

[Superfluous J]

The current version of this is a bit harder than I'd realized upon testing it. I'm new to making missions, and was under the impression that checkpoints were in the missions that you distribute. They are not, and are only for testing purposes.

So, if you crash you lose and have to start over, whereas I intended that you should be able to go back to the last checkpoint. This is particularly bad for this mission as it takes some time to complete and the two hardest things (Tylo and Laythe) are the last 2 things you do. It is NO FUN to crash on Tylo and instantly get a GAME OVER and have to start back with the Pol lander.

I'm leaving this up, because it's still cool and if you beat it you beat it in Hardcore mode and should be proud of yourself. However, I'll be modifying it in the near future (some time in the next week hopefully) so that crashing isn't an insta-lose so you have a chance to restore from a quicksave.

[Superfluous J]

Okay I said "next week" three weeks ago, but It's been fixed now. The mission is still hard but now the cost of failure is reloading and trying again, not throwing your computer out the window in frustration.

Note the link on KerbalX is different so you'll need to go there to get the new file, not the old mission link. I don't think KerbalX supports modifying missions yet (or I just couldn't figure out how).

I also submitted it to Steam Workshop but as of right now it's not updated there. I assume it will in the next mumbleteen minutes or so.

[Superfluous J]

Okay version 3 is up and - as before - it's a new mission on Steam Workshop AND KerbalX.

[dvader]

That was a fun mission! Trying to land at Tylo with just full throttle or no throttle was about as hard as expected. Afterwards, I thought "Great, now it's just Laythe. That's some nice and easy flying" but... yeah... not so much without control . I noticed the plane had landing gears but are you really supposed to land? I was not even close to doing that. I could fly, but not straight or control which side was "up". I figured I'd just fall to the ground using the parachutes but exploded several times because the terminal velocity was too high. I don't know if it was an intended puzzle to solve but the only solution I could find was to deploy the parachutes and ...

Spoiler

... reverse thrust on the turbofan engine and point the nose down.

That finally brought the speed down below 7 m/s so things did not go boom.

A very nice little mission! Thanks for making it!

[Superfluous J]

On 9/12/2018 at 12:26 PM, dvader said:

That was a fun mission!

Thank you! It was fun making it.

Regarding Laythe... yes. You are intended to land it on land like a plane, and use the chutes to slow down quickly because I mean come on you're landing a plane with almost no control.

I found that keeping the navball in "orbit" mode and utilizing ALL the buttons (okay maybe not target or maneuver but at least one each of the 3 pairs of directions) allowed a shocking amount of control, including control of the bank tilt of the plane for slow turns (if necessary) or to stop it from slowly turning (which was essential).

I need to do it again because it's been a LONG time since I completed it, essentially the day I posted it. But it is very doable if odd and fiddly.

[probe137]

On 5/11/2018 at 3:48 PM, Superfluous J said:

I would suggest not even installing Kerbal Engineer so you don't even know things like how far off the ground you are.

Altimeter, set altitude readings to altitude from ground level

[Superfluous J]

13 hours ago, probe137 said:

Altimeter, set altitude readings to altitude from ground level

That didn't exist in mid-2018.

[probe137]

4 hours ago, Superfluous J said:

That didn't exist in mid-2018.

Ok