SkyRender

Just to show how easy it is to work with this particular colonization kit, I've made a quick expansion to Shelby. This time I'm sending up some auxiliary equipment: science lab, mining/conversion unit, and extra power. It's kinda lopsided... An old trick for rendezvous taught by Scott Manley is to use a maneuver node over your target to kill your lateral velocity, then fire at the halfway mark of total burn time. It works pretty well! This time decoupling was a bit trickier since I couldn't do heavy rolls thanks to the solar panels. But I managed it in the end! All linked up! Shelby is better-equipped now for survival and science. Huzzah! The mining unit, incidentally, has a KAS winch on it for fuel transfer to any visiting spacecraft. See why I recommended that mod? Mun Colony "Shelby" 6 Colonists + Life Support - 10 POINTs DSN Connection - 2 POINTs Science Array - 1 POINT Fuel Refinery - 2 POINTs Total - 15 POINTs

The PBS Colonization Challenge It's time for Kerbalkind to colonize the solar system! Using the Planetary Base Systems (PBS) mod in conjunction with TAC Life Support, this has become a very real prospect. Mission Control has taken a contract of absurd proportions for this without your consent (what else is new?), but fortunately it's pretty flexible. As long as you fulfill at least part of the contract, they'll be happy. Of course, if you can fulfill the whole thing (or go above and beyond), they'll be even happier. (How did they get a contract in a Sandbox file, you ask? It's better you not know the answer to that one...) The Contract Mission Control's really done it this time... The contract for this mission is just plain absurd. Rockomax has requested that you colonize every single celestial body in the solar system (except Jool and the sun, for obvious reasons). This means at least 6 Kerbals per planet or moon, able to sustain themselves without outside resources being delivered to them. They'd really like it if you could somehow get 300 Kerbals per celestial body, which sounds like a huge chore... The contract further stipulates that they should be able to traverse the planet or moon if possible via rover. They also want full communications at all times with Kerbin via the Deep Space Network. And every colony is tasked with being able to produce fuel for any visiting spacecraft to boot. They're even demanding a full complement of scientific experiments, and a processing lab. As if that wasn't enough, the contract ALSO stipulates that there needs to be an (unoccupied) orbital station for each planet/moon, and a means for the Kerbals living on the surface to return to Kerbin. Apparently there's something in there about an orbital zero-G sports arena too, but that bit is pretty vague... Fulfilling the Contract We know this contract is absurd, so we've broken the whole thing down into a more manageable system. The priorities for the contract have been weighted, adjusted, and just generally shifted about so they actually make sense to anyone not versed in Kerbal legalese. We've called the resulting values Priority Offering Integration Numeric Tabulations, or POINTs. Here's how it works out: * Each colony MUST contain a minimum of 6 Kerbals * Each colony MUST have enough self-sustaining life support for all inhabitants * Meeting these two requirements is worth 10 POINTs * Each additional colonist (fully supported, remember!) is worth 1 POINT; our cutoff is 30 total, meaning a maximum of 24 POINTs extra * Including a rover (or rovers) is worth 2 POINTs; it/they MUST be able to carry at least half of your colonists at any given time * You can get an extra 1 POINT if your rover(s) can carry all of your colonists at any given time * Having a shielded storage area for the rover(s) is worth 1 POINT, but only if all rovers can be stored at any given time! * Having a DSN connection back to Kerbin at all times is worth 2 POINTs * Having a fully-decked-out science array (just the stock experiments) with lab is worth 1 POINT * Having a mining system that produces fuel for spaceships (you have to have some way to actually get the fuel to them, remember!) is worth 2 POINTs * Having an orbital station able to hold as many Kerbals as the colony is populated with is worth 6 POINTs * We have no idea how the zero-G sports thing would work, honestly, but it's worth 1 POINT anyway; we'll leave it to your discretion... * Having a means to return to Kerbin is worth a variable amount of POINTs, based on the body in question; see below This means that a fully decked-out colony with full orbital support is worth 50 POINTs. But that's just the base score, of course; not all bodies are created equal after all! There are multipliers involved based on which bodies you choose. POINTs are worth: Mun: 1x (return bonus: 2 POINTs) Minmus: 1x (return bonus: 2 POINTs) Duna: 2x (return bonus: 8 POINTs) Ike: 2.5x (return bonus: 7 POINTs) Eve: 3x (return bonus: 100 POINTs) Gilly: 3.5x (return bonus: 10 POINTs) Dres: 3.5x (return bonus: 12 POINTs) Moho: 5x (return bonus: 30 POINTs) Laythe: 5x (return bonus: 40 POINTs) Tylo: 5x (return bonus: 50 POINTs) Vall: 4x (return bonus: 25 POINTs) Bop: 4x (return bonus: 20 POINTs) Pol: 4x (return bonus: 20 POINTs) Eeloo: 5x (return bonus: 30 POINTs) Colony Extensions The contract has an additional clause concerning multiple colonies! Once you've filled an entire colony on a planet or moon (ie. you have 30 Kerbals living there), you can add another site. And once that site's full up, you can add another! For sanity's sake, the population is capped at 10 colonies per planet or moon. That's a lot of Kerbals, after all! Sites at least 5KM apart from one another can be designated as separate colonies, scoring an additional 10 POINTs for the first 6 colonists at that new site (and of course, 1 POINT per additional Kerbal up to 30 total colonists and 24 POINTs extra). However, separate sites like this MUST have rovers that can reach one another, present at all sites! You can't get any additional POINTs for DSN connection or rover storage or anything from this, either; anything your colonies as a whole have for a planet or moon for those sorts of things, that's it for those bonuses. You do NOT need to provide additional space on the orbital station for the extra colony's Kerbals, but (assuming you want the return bonus) you DO need to provide sufficient facilities to allow for all Kerbals present to return to Kerbin in one grand exodus if the need arises. In other words, you need to be able to get all resident Kerbals off the surface of the planet or moon they're on within a reasonable timeframe and get them all back to Kerbin within a very close timeframe to one another. No Kerbal left behind, in short! The upshot is, you get the return bonus amount for each colony built when the requirements are met. Now that's generosity! Limitations and Bonuses Time is of the essence in this contract, or at least that's what they keep telling us. Rockomax has set a hard time limit of 25 years to get all of your colonies in place. Any longer than that and they're not interested. What a bunch of skinflints! (That's 25 years from the first launch to any given body for that body, mind. They're not crazy, just strict.) For some reason Rockomax really wants that zero-G sports thing to happen. They said something about "bonus POINTs for really creative entries". We asked them how they knew about POINTs, but they didn't have an answer for us. There may be a covert Rockomax agent in Mission Control... Proof of Delivery To get credit for all of your hard work, you need to show: * At least 1 shot of the launch process; you don't have to show every single one! * At least 1 shot of the completed colony, showcasing all features * At least 1 shot per orbital feature included (station, relay, etc.) * A map shot showing the DSN connection, if you're going for that bonus; we'll let you skip this requirement for the Mun since it's Kerbin-synchronous * A map shot showing the distance between colonies for multiple sites You can expand locations at a later date, and enhance what they offer as you see fit. For sanity's sake, it's recommended that you have separate save files for each planet or moon colonization effort. Otherwise, you're going to have some serious slowdown issues by your fifth or sixth colonization effort... Mods You can't really participate in this challenge without the mods required to do it. Those mods are: Planetary Base Systems (obviously, right?) TAC Life Support Some recommended mods include: Kerbal Attachment System Kerbal Inventory System As for other mods, go for it! The only stipulation I have is that you not use any "cheat-y" mods (ie. with parts or functionality that either let you bypass the game's challenges entirely or are just plain overpowered). MechJeb, Kerbal Engineer Redux, Kerbal Alarm Clock, and other "assistance" mods are allowed, BUT you have to specify that you've used them so I can list them alongside your score. I don't have any beef against those sorts of things (I use KER and KAC both!), particularly for something this massive in scope. However, there is a certain point of pride for some players in doing something like this entirely on their own. For their sake, let's all be honest about what tools we're using. Some Useful Information This can be a pretty daunting challenge for newcomers, so here are a number of handy tips to help your efforts along. * Each greenhouse module produces enough food for 6 Kerbals, and needs 1 algae farm, access to ore via a rock drill, and access to water via a water drill to function (plus standard life support resources) * You should probably also add a carbon extractor and water purifier, as well as space to store life support and life support byproducts (and ore too!) * Powering the lot of this is going to take around 15 electric charge per second at all times; prepare accordingly * You have to activate greenhouses and the like for them to do anything, and you need Kerbals manning greenhouses in particular to get anything out of them Colonization Hall of Fame Here you can see who's who in the PBS challenge! Every colony's value, as well as the grand total value of all colonies founded, can be found here. Eidahlil - 225 POINTs (using KER and MechJeb) Vall Colony - 225 POINTs Sky Render - 43 POINTs (using KER and KAC) Mun Colony "Shelby" - 43 POINTs And here's my own first contribution! Basically, this is just a sample of how the whole thing generally works. Here's the core of the first colony sent up, straight to the Mun! The nice thing about the Mun is, if you land in just the right spot (ie. anywhere on literally half the Mun), you always have connectivity to Kerbin via the DSN. Ergo, easy 2 POINTs right there! The launch stage is ditched just before landing, so it blows up in a pleasing manner and lets me soft-land this colony base. For assembly, I basically relied on reaction wheels and the Mun's low gravity to allow me to rock-and-roll these things off the sides and top of the rocket stack. Then I used the wheels to roll them over to the hub, and link up! Here's the colony as it ended up. Nothing fancy, but ripe for expansion. And expanded it will be, of course! That's half the fun of these challenges. Mun Colony "Shelby" 6 Colonists + Life Support - 10 POINTs DSN Connection - 2 POINTs Total - 12 POINTs

Love this mod, but I've found a bit of a problem with it... The garage parts that allow attached landing legs will occasionally (read: almost always) cause the gear attached to them to think that they're stowed inside the bay instead of attached to the outside. The door in particular seems to have a big issue with this.

I never used it to begin with. KER is about as in-depth as I go, and only for the design stage so I don't have to hand-calculate the dV/TWR values.

Years ago, there was a colonization challenge on this forum that was quite a lot of fun. You may want to do a modern variant of that. The challenge was basically this: get at least 6 Kerbals each living comfortably on as many celestial bodies as possible. Bonus points were awarded for colonies that had rovers, mining facilities, and other auxiliary structures, as well as having more Kerbals living there. For added challenge, also stick on a life support mod like TAC Life Support.

Long, long ago (specifically on August 9th 2011), an LPer called Maxwell Adams posted a video showcasing Kerbal Space Program 0.8.4. I found this video some time in late October of the same year, and was fascinated. I went to download the game right away, and the rest is history (5 years in the making now!).

All of my relays are referred to as SatNet {Body/Orbit} Relays. So for example, I have SatNet GSO Relays, SatNet Mun Relays, SatNet Minmus Relays, SatNet Solar Relays, and so on.

The problem is that the game does not look at your actual achievements before generating contracts. Or rather, it looks one level ahead now. So if you've done a fair bit of Mun work but have an active Mun exploration contract, for example, you'll start getting Minmus contracts. If you have an active Minmus contract, you'll start getting Duna contracts.

I would like the new contract system even more if it took note of the contract types you never accept/always reject and stop generating them so often. No, I do not wish to perform aerial surveys, nor will I ever.

How about Inline Surface/Orbital-Capable Extra-Light Exploration Spacecraft?

Sure! Resonance (in orbital terms) means that your orbit is such that the surface of the planet is aligned with the object in orbit. A 1:2 resonance, for example, means that for every 1 day, the satellite will be directly overhead 2 times that day. At a 2:1 resonance, the satellite will be directly overhead once every 2 days. Therefore, at 1:1 resonance, the satellite is tracking perfectly with the surface. We refer to this as "geosynchronous orbit", or in the case of Kerbin, Kerbosynchronous orbit.

Technically it was yesterday, but I decided to mess around a bit with the communications system in the beta and see what I could do with a Kerbosynchronous satellite ring. I do so love my orbital synchronization calculator. So useful...

Oh I have a laundry list of favorite punny names for vessels. First planetary missions tend to get those: Mohotivated Eve Ent Horizon Dunaverse Dresperate Joolific Eeloosive I've also had a few one-offs over the years, like the Alpaca Lips.

I have something of a strategy, a long-time hold-over from the earliest days of the tech tree that still works well even now. The first mission is the obligatory "sub-orbital flight plus science grab" one, the second is a basic orbiting one (that goes to high Kerbin orbit too if possible), and the third is a multi-landing Minmus trip with a scientist. From there I have enough science and Funds to build a Mun-sweeper mission that basically gets me all the science from the Mun (except for Gravioli data, of course; unlocking the top tier of the R&D facility is not nearly so swift). And that pretty much gives me all the science I ever need.

Every day is Modder Appreciation Day for me. So many games I love, the main reason why I do love them so is because modders have made them a whole new (or much deeper) experience than originally intended by the developers. I don't mind the wait when the returns are so awesome.

Please let this mod get updated... Being at the mercy of the randomizer is not fun when all the game generates is the absolute worst kind of contracts, and punishes you for refusing to take on said contracts. I miss the days when refusing a contract was penalty-free...

Excellent, the best life support mod lives on!

I haven't really been around much these last 5 or 6 months, have I? Well, that would be because life has settled into a decidedly more busy norm than ever before. Mom and I are doing well, and my best friend has moved up from Texas to live with us too, so the financial situation at least is pretty stable. I'm working generally at or close to full time hours every week, and what little free time I have these days has been eaten up by Stardew Valley. I'm more or less done with everything in that game now, however (at least until its next update), so I should have more time now to do the things I used to do before my world went pear-shaped. Like post to this forum! Thank you again to everyone who supported my mother and I during our rough patch. We really appreciate it, even now!

I too am in the "went to do something else when KSP started to get tiring" category. Still love the game, mind you, but time away helps a lot.

I don't know if I was the first to discover it, but I was definitely (at least one of) the first to post a screenshot of the short-lived eclipse shadow system in one of the earliest builds of KSP:

You could always tell yourself a story to justify it. Perhaps the brave Kerbal who is doomed to live their final days on Eve has a terminal illness. Perhaps they're a notorious criminal who wants one last chance to do something useful for society instead of getting a lethal injection. Maybe they're part of a cult that thinks Eve is inhabitable and they've sabotaged the mission to land instead of orbit and return. Role-playing can justify all sorts of things that would seem inhumane without such context.

In KSP at least, cargo bays are mostly only for aesthetics once you're in space proper. Better to build a severely docking-friendly design:

Long-timer here (joined November 2011), reporting in. I haven't posted much lately due to recent events plus unpacking from the move they resulted in, but I am definitely still around.

Oh can of worms... Let's see. I have installed: 0.18.4 0.18.4 (modded) 0.19 0.19.1 0.20 0.20.1 0.20.2 0.20.2 (modded) 0.21 0.21.1 0.21.1 (modded) 0.22 0.23 0.23 (modded) 0.23.5 0.24 0.24.2 0.25 0.90 0.90 (reinstall) 1.0 1.0.2 1.0.3 1.0.4 1.0.5 I also have 0.7.3, 0.11.1, 0.12, 0.13, 0.13.1, 0.14, 0.14.2, 0.15, 0.16, 0.17, and 0.24.1 on disk in .ZIP format. No, I don't really know why either.

Alright, this officially makes zero sense. I extracted the exact same contents from the exact same .ZIP file, and now all of the settings are somehow correct again. I reiterate, absolutely everything I did was identical, but I got different results. I think my computer is officially insane. Whatever the case, technically the problem is solved. Thank you for the help. EDIT: ...And upon reloading the game, all of the values are borked again. What. The. Hell. And it's not even randomly borked, they've somehow reset themselves to exactly the same wrong values as before. Someone, please, make sense of this madness! EDIT 2: I figured it out! It's completely nonsensical, but I've figured it out! The "start in directory" field for the desktop icon was pointing to the KSP 1.0 folder, and apparently KSP uses that value to decide where it's loading configuration data from. That explains an awful lot of weirdness I was experiencing with KSP 1.0.2, 1.0.3, and 1.0.4. PSA: if you just update your desktop icon when installing KSP, be SURE you also change the starting directory field!