cantab

The NASA parts and I assume the asteroid mechanics are in a separate folder in GameData. You're free to delete it.For that matter, you're free to delete the Squad folder from there too. Some people do, and play only with mod parts. Now you can't, without making a mod, get rid of stuff like the stronger joints, or the changes to the conics and the manoeuvre node, or the ability to timewarp in the Space Centre and Tracking Station. But seriously, I have to wonder why on Kerbin you'd want to. It's easier if you know what you're doing. New players generally DON'T. I certainly didn't. My first rocket to reach orbit needed about 18 small SRBs just to get a ship with a 1-man pod up there, because I didn't know that going too fast too low was bad.

We know the game does already support fixing a ship to the ground, because we have Launch Clamps*. The claw or any other ground anchor could presumably work the same way. *Assuming the launch clamps aren't simply implemented as extremely massive objects. But I don't believe they are.

Why and why not? The Moon still isn't that far away, I really don't see how you benefit from stopping at LEO.And the biggest problem with stopping at a LEO station is that the Moon's orbit precesses. You either need to make the LEO station's orbit precess to match it, meaning it uses more fuel, or you face big inclination changes during the lunar transfer orbit.

In .23.5 I've changed to no persistent debris. I like it, but I like keeping the framerate up more. (I don't know just how much the debris affects the framerate, but my PC's marginal enough for playing KSP as it is.)

It's extremely useful. As mentioned, lower thrust means a longer burn time. If your boosters are giving more thrust than you need, you'll get more out of them by reducing it, just the same as if you're using liquid engines. If they're overheating, taking the thrust limiter down a bit can stop that too. Indeed, it's probably more useful on SRBs than on liquid engines, since it's the ONLY way to control the behaviour of SRBs.

I've not tried a shuttle, but from what I've heard they're among the hardest things to get right. Crucial is that the orbiter's engines must thrust through the centre of the mass of the whole thing, or as near as you can get them. That means the orbiter's main engines are going to go on last. (Unless you take the approach of two external tanks so it's balanced, which looks kooky but can work.)

Velocity Raptor is a cool special relativistic flash game. Pretty challenging too.

In my view, if we want to establish a self-sustaining colony on any other worlds, we should first prove we can do that here on Earth. Specifically, we should colonise the interior of Antarctica. With low temperatures like on Mars, long nights like on the Moon, and the requirement to grow all food on site without the benefit of soil, it will be an invaluable stepping stone. If we cannot establish a settlement in Antarctica without relying on constant supply shipments, what hope have we got of expanding beyond Earth?

The cold fusion bug. It got patched though.

If you don't bother the asteroids, the asteroids won't bother you

Until we have multiplayer, it's virtually irrelevant, because the camera and microphone move with the ship you're flying. The only case I can think of when you would hear a Doppler shift, without deliberate contrivance, is on an in-flight breakup where engines go off burning in different directions.

Well, I turned off debris in my new save anyway. Much though I love seeing it around, KSP is marginal on my PC and I love framerate more.

In-game, Minmus. You don't have to worry about launch windows, and it's easier to land on than the Mun. The only minus is having to be aware of inclinations when approaching, but that's easily mastered. From an "in-Universe" perspective, Laythe by a country mile.

Yes. I don't know what the minimum distance is, but it's further than you have. You should be able to find out on the ground. Mount a couple of the big structural panels sticking out horizontally, then mount engines out above them, making it easy to adjust the heigh of the engines.

The LV-1 got a buff too. It now gives 4 kN, the ion engine gives 2 and is also nearly ten times the LV-1's mass.True, the LV-1 is always going to be a bit situational. Only on the very lightest of probes will it give more delta-V than the 48-7S. You could use it as a Vernier thruster on a bigger craft, but RCS is arguably better for that, though the LV-1 allows finer control of thrust. I don't think actual impactors are that common. In one visit to the Tracking Station I got an atmosphere grazer and a couple of other near passes, none E class, and no impactors yet. In any case, feel free to ignore them. The E-class asteroids are about the size of the Chelyabinsk meteorite. "Realistically" you could let dozens impact and you'd have maybe one town get hit at worst. Grabbing asteroids being exactly a planned near-future space mission. The new parts are for whatever you want them to be. I'm using the big SRB to launch a minimalistic probe that's going to go on and do a Pioneer-style mission. Sure, what used to be big and challenging to get into orbit isn't so big any more. But that just makes "big" BIGGER. Or just delete the NASAmission folder from your GameData, and all the new parts will be gone. Now this I can agree with somewhat. But I think that Squad were probably conscious of the game's known performance issues. The engine cluster and the LFB help keep part counts down (though not as much as the stronger joints obviating the need for struts everywhere). For those of us whose PCs struggle a bit to play KSP - and there are lots of us - that's a major boon.Still, not having the KR-1 and KS-25 as single engines is a bit of a bummer. In terms of thrust they'd nicely fill the rather large gap between the Skipper and the Mainsail. Personally I find it just plain satisfying to successfully save my Kerbals when the rocket under them undergoes an unscheduled disassembly. (Of course, I didn't need the LES for that, but I'll give it a go in future anyway.)

The Doctors made it look like the Time Lords and Daleks had annihilated each other, while actually suspending Gallifrey in time

That probably just means your command module was facing the opposite way from the claw.

The "Rockomax HubMax Multi-Point Connector" and the "BZ-52 Radial Attachment Point" are the most visually pleasing way to radially attached things. They're 1.25m parts, you can still stick the Clamp-o-Tron seniors straight to them, or if you want use the Rockomax adapters. Here are some examples: I've not actually tested them for stability, but I expect they'd be decent, and if you do need to strut them it shouldn't look too bad. EDIT: Seeing your screenshot, yeah, switch to the radial attachment points, and either rockomax adapter depending on how much distance you want. (If you want more than even the deep adapter gives, add an empty fuel tank.)

Yes, you have to exit out of your flight and your save and go to the Settings on the main menu for this, and most settings tbh. It changes the size of most of the flight UI elements. IIRC the navball, the staging icons, the altimeter, the control indicators in the bottom right, and the clock are all covered. I don't think the Resources indicator or the right-click dialogues are affected. If you only change it by one notch you might not notice, but whack it up to the top and you'll definitely see the difference

So far I've got one set to graze the atmosphere - which I'm hoping to aerocapture into Kerbin orbit, but none yet on an impact course. Also IIRC I've got one that's on course to get a gravity assist from Kerbin out to Duna's orbit. I think I'll see if I can get that into orbit around Ike. On which note, a question about flags on parts. If I send two ships up, with different flags on their parts, and then I dock them together, will the different flags be preserved correctly?

You can switch it to Earth time in the configs if you want. I believe that utilities like launch window planners are likely to use Earth time, so you might need it until they're updated. And yes, Kerbin's day always was 6 hours.

Yo dawg, I heard you like flags...

Clearly, the water doesn't HAVE density. It just repels some things, making them float, and attracts others, making them sink.

Just remember that the game's aero model isn't at all accurate. Aerodynamics are kind of important for water rocket performance, so it's a bit of an omission. But you can cover things like delta-v, thrust-to-weight ratio, specific impulse, the rocket equation, staging, and of course orbital mechanics very well from the demo.

The simplest method: Launch to LKO. Set Minmus as target. Set a manouvre node at the ascending or descending node. Whichever is highest above Kerbin, if there's a big difference. Drag the normal or antinormal (purple) handles until you see the AN and DN swap places. Make that manouvre. Now your orbit is aligned with Minmus's, just encounter it like you would the Mun. This isn't the lowest delta-V method, so pack a few hundred more m/s than the delta-v map tells you. The Ascending and Descending nodes indicate where Minmus's orbital plane crosses yours. Typically you'll be in an equatorial low Kerbin orbit, but not always.