GoSlash27

steuben, Actually, no it's not. All that is "required" is to acknowledge that you're no longer dealing with a Hohmann transfer at that point, so there's no upper bound. Best, -Slashy

I don't consider collecting the KSC science an "exploit", and I farm it in every career. I farm the pad and runway first, then do low/high rocket flights, then orbit, then come back and begin farming KSC and Kerbin once I've unlocked aviation parts. It's not "skipping parts of the tech tree", it's just developing my career in an efficient and orderly manner. Also point in fact: I don't need the high tech stuff unlocked in order to run my space program because I am adept at getting things done with small, cheap lifters. Best, -Slashy

Victor12, Step1: Get it flying. Sounds snarky, but it's actually not. Step 2: Get it supersonic. Some designs have gobs of power and can break the sound barrier effortlessly. Others need to be coaxed into the supersonic regime. My really low- thrust designs need to climb to around 3km altitude (sometimes as high as 6km) before the drag is sufficiently low to exceed 360 m/sec in level flight. Step 3: ??? Profit. Once you get beyond 360 m/sec airspeed, the drag will reduce and the thrust will increase. It will accelerate at a surprising rate. You need to climb out at about 15° to keep ahead of the thermal and drag penalties. You may find that the handling gets weird in this area, since stock KSP gives no indication of pressure center. Step 4: Gently reduce your climb to approach level flight at around 18 km altitude to squeeze all the airspeed you can out of the jet engines. The altitude varies with the engines in use. Then gently increase the climb until you are no longer accelerating or the engines flame out. Step 5: Go closed cycle and climb out to orbit. Best, -Slashy

steuben, There is no "Tom". Tom is undefined. You can't execute a Hohmann transfer between planets that are misaligned. If you wish to forego a Hohmann transfer to enable an immediate transfer between planets that are "perfectly" misaligned, it will take an infinite change in velocity, but it is no longer a Hohmann transfer. If, however, you insist on a true Hohmann transfer then the DV remains as the minimum. You just have to wait for an infinite period for your transfer orbit to wander into the SoI of the target planet. Best, -Slashy

Kerbart, I hope this is indeed what the OP is after. I can answer that Best, -Slashy

I'm with Hebaru on this one. I'm having trouble understanding exactly what it is you're after. The absolute maximum DV you could expend during a Hohmann transfer?

Chuckles at "Hold my bear"...

DDE, Ahh, I see. It's all so confusing! The convo keeps skipping around from WWII to modern naval systems, to hard sci- fi to soft sci- fi... A lotta strands in ol' Dooder's head, man... Best, -Slashy

Gilead, Are you rotating nose- first? If so, that's your problem. Your ship needs to be stable reentering backwards. All mass needs to be as close to the heat shield as possible, and it helps if the nose is draggy. Best, -Slashy

Laie, It's really more a matter of finding the lowest altitude at which you can punch through Mach 1 without incurring excessive heating and drag afterwards. A low drag/ low thrust plane behaves a lot differently than a high drag/ high thrust plane, and the behavior of any plane changes radically once you clear Mach 1.3 or so. The key to the whole thing is getting supersonic as efficiently as you can. Once you clear that point, the plane goes all "super saiyan" and it's easy to get to orbit. Some can do it right on the deck, others need more altitude. Best, -Slashy

Ah, but the combat ranges shown in the movies were necessary because cinematography. Not strictly necessary in Jhorriga's fictional universe. Naval combat was rarely pushed to the ranges shown in the movies even in WWII unless somebody screwed up. Or somebody with a rising sun flag decided that it was a one- way trip Best, -Slashy DDE, Okay, now I'm confused. Why am I looking at a pic of the Kuznetsov in the context of WWII? Best, -Slashy

Actually, your example is backwards. It is worth it to dive back to LKO from Minmus for a Duna transfer, but it is not worth it to dive back from the Mun. Contrary to popular belief, the Oberth effect does not always trump the gravity well. There is an optimal altitude where the transfer costs the least DV. Lower than this, and the penalty of the gravity well is more than the Oberth savings, and vice versa when you go higher. This optimal orbital radius is known as the "gate orbit". For a trip from Kerbin to Duna, the gate orbit is 7.8Mm. For a trip to Eve, it's 11Mm. The farther the transfer, the lower the gate orbit. Best, -Slashy *edit* D'OH! Beaten by @OhioBob

Modern rockets, yes. Modern lasers, OTOH, have zero effect on the balance of forces, even today. As for how it translates to this imaginary sci- fi world, rockets would take the place of torpedoes. Modern missiles operate in a very different environment than space, and would require reaction thrusters in order to maneuver. In this imaginary universe, modern missiles have the least DV of any propulsion system. Best, -Slashy

Actually, not so much. Airplanes don't take on surface combatants singly. They swarm and overwhelm your defenses. You may *think* that long range guns trump air power, but that question has been roundly answered. The aircraft carrier rendered the battleship obsolete as a capital ship. And again... you should really have an understanding of naval history and doctrine if you're going to attempt to use it as an analogy. Best, -Slashy

Ah, but you still have to get within range. Fighters patrol many hundreds of km's away. They will spot you and call in strikes to take you out long before you get in range. That's something you've got to understand; carriers don't just steam around with their complement on their deck, waiting for trouble. They have air ops going 24/7. Those planes are out patrolling, hunting subs, shadowing suspicious vessels, etc. They maintain a constant air cover that protects hundreds of nautical miles away from the ships. Best, -Slashy

The latter. Best, -Slashy

They had a bad experience in the past with their AI combat systems. They went haywire and started searching for Sarah Connor. Now nobody trusts AI. Best, -Slashy

Cassel, I have no idea, I didn't count. I was just correcting the statement that they didn't have aerial rockets back then. They did, and they were quite effective. Best, -Slashy

Or even pure bombs could model bombs. Nothing but a big ol' iron case filled with semtex and a proximity fuse. The fighter releases it while on an intercept course with the target, and it simply keeps its vector until impact (or miss). The closer the fighter gets before release, the more likelihood of an impact, but also the likelihood of the fighter being destroyed by defensive fire. Best, -Slashy

Oh, no... There were rockets and they were used to devastating effect. A flight of F4U Corsairs could unload a barrage of "Holy Moses" rockets that was as powerful as the broadside from a cruiser. I'd think that rockets in this universe would make a useful analogue to torpedoes or bombs. Best, -Slashy Agreed, and that's probably a big part of the fictional limitations; everything that requires energy also requires heat dissipation. Best, -Slashy

Rizzo, I'd have to rerun the numbers to be sure, but I believe low munar orbit is preferable in all cases because it's a relatively weak gravity well and Oberth is where the savings are coming from. The more Vxs , The lower your gate orbit will be. Best, -Slashy

I agree. I've never been a fan of the concept of fighters being able to sneak through shields. I consider "shields" in soft sci- fi to be nothing more than temporary armor. The reason to use fighters is the same as it was in WWII; they can carry a weapon capable of crippling a capital ship or destroying an escort, can overwhelm the defenses when they attack in numbers with good coordination, and is much safer than having your capital ships and escorts slugging it out like dreadnoughts at Jutland. Best, -Slashy

tater, Fighters have been used as missiles since back in WWII, perhaps earlier. See the V-1, Kamikaze attacks, etc. One thing I think we can all safely agree on: @Jhorriga, you should probably request to have this thread moved to the Lounge. Best, -Slashy

Functional <> practical. Current directed energy "weapons" are technology demonstrators, not practical weapon systems. We currently have actual weapons that can obliterate missiles with far more reliability and flexibility than directed energy, and they don't require insane mass and power generation to do it. Conversely, we have weapons that match today's directed energy tech's size and weight that can take out entire cities. Perhaps it's the same in Jhorriga's fictional universe; you could build a simple laser with sufficient power to take out the target, but it's impractically large, unwieldy, and consumes too much power to be viable. They chose to go with a maguffin tech that delivers the same energy from a smaller, more flexible source that doesn't draw so much power... but transit time is greatly reduced. Perhaps not. Certainly not in his universe. Nobody's going to build a capital ship just to take out the occasional missile. A capital ship is going to have the capacity to take out other capital ships, and pretty much anything else that stands in their way. My maguffin 8 ball says that ships in his universe use a different propulsion system than fighters. Something with exceptionally high Isp, but low thrust. This allows them to travel for months or even years, but makes them bulky and ponderous, like WWII surface combatants. Tactical craft, OTOH, have a completely different propulsion system that allows for high acceleration and maneuverability and light weight... but limits their fuel supply to hours. And perhaps *all* of it relies on energy management, so while a capital ship could employ laser "pea shooters" with zero transit time and limited effectiveness, they simply wouldn't choose to go that way. Best, -Slashy

^ What @mikegarrison said. Each department has a list of positions that are deemed "essential" or "nonessential", and in some cases nonessential positions can be exempted. I don't think that anyone knows for sure which nonessential workers (if any) have been exempted or which are essential. All we know for sure is that there won't be any launches in the meantime unless there's an emergency. Best, -Slashy