Russoft

Either you encountered a bug (which I haven't seen yet), or you mismanaged your science reports. I've accidentally discarded data rather than keeping it before. It's also possible you transmitted it or removed it from the command pod. Did you use a separate lander? I've left all my science in landers before and returned to Kerbin empty handed. But yes, command pods only store one copy of each science report at a time, from what I understand.

I must compliment your Photoshop skills!

Considering all the asteroids near Kerbin, I'll bet Kerbals are so motivated to go to space because they all know someone whose house was smashed by a meteor impact. Sure, Earth also has plenty of impacts, but we have way more surface area so we don't notice all the impacts. Kerbals, on the other hand, are reminded regularly that a killer asteroid may hit Kerbin one day soon.

Yeah, if I was going to write something like that, it'd definitely be in Matlab. I realize not everyone has access to it though.

I find I'm still learning new things. I'll save a lifter/lander/etc to be used later, only to build one from scratch because I have learned a better way to do it. Detailed planning also consumes way too much of my non-gaming (work, family) life so I've vowed to keep any planning to in-game time. This means my missions are pretty haphazard. But I understand your addiction.

Yes! Kerbals want to proliferate images of their race throughout the universe so they attach them to space probes and plant them on other planets.

One of my other favorite games is Silent Hunter. By simply adjusting realism settings, the game is well suited to novice players who simply want an arcade game and advanced players who want a realistic simulator. If there were toggles for money hi/med/low/off, life support on/off (I actually don't think it's necessary at all for the game, but I digress), re-entry heating on/off, respawning kerbals on/off, science low/med/hi, Force IVA on/off, Quicksave on/off, equipment reliability perfect/hi/med/low, etc, then I don't see the need to change the physics. Just add or remove other challenging aspects.

Nevermind... I was going to question the radius of the tank, then realized you got it right.

when you catch yourself scribbling rocket designs while on the bus to/from work (or worse, at work).

When I bought this game, I bought it "as-is". The game is in development with no obligation on Squad's part to do anything further.

by liquid fuel booster, do you mean the LFB KR1x2 (white and black two-engine plus fuel tank part)? If so, another difference is that you can't use anything below it. No decouplers, etc. Of course, mainsails aren't often used in upper stages either...

From my experience, the most useful setup is a lander with radially mounted drop tanks and science modules. I land, transfer fuel, drop the fuel tanks, do science, drop the science modules, and return to orbit with a lighter lander. Since I rendezvous with my capsule and leave the lander in orbit anyway, it probably doesn't help much to drop weight on the planet's surface. A staged lander makes more sense if the lander is going to make the trip all the way back to Kerbin.

Orbital rendezvous is easy but I don't have the patience to align ships before docking. I just mash the docking ports together until I dock.

when you stick a decoupler between your engine and gas tank. I did this on a lander this week. Not sure what I was thinking. Bill Kerman impacted the Mun at high velocity.

You know you're a noob if your wife hasn't started commenting on the amount of time you spend playing KSP and not spending time with her.

Done. Luckily I had a terribly overweight ship with enough delta-V to REVERSE my orbit and rendezvous.

Bahaha, my thoughts on the real thing too. But Kerbals are bred for one-way missions. Besides, I don't have the patience for a Mars Direct mission right now (I've been playing a career mode where I try to replicate historic spaceflight missions in chronological order).

Began building vehicles for my "Duna One" mission (reminiscent of the future Mars One mission). Flew a rocket for one orbit around Kerbin entirely from IVA (never done that before)

I document which mission (and sometimes the crew of the mission), what science, and mistakes. e.g.: Phoebus 3 landing site: Collected sample, goo, materials, EVA, and crew report from Northwest Crater. Note to self: Next time don't mount rover under engine. Had to leave it in orbit as a result. Or, if a Kerbal dies: Joeke Kerman: Here lies Joeke Kerman. He died in an EVA jet pack malfunction during Phoebus 2. He is missed by his crew: Bob and Chuck Kerman.

Back in the demo I made a landing (successfully) on the Mun. I'm pretty sure Minmus didn't exist in the demo, but then maybe I was just such a noob I didn't realize it was there. You know you're a newb when you attach a rover directly beneath the poodle engine on your lander and fail to at least attach radial engines.

you know you're a newb when you EVA while in physics acceleration and see your kerbal turn to dust. when you can't climb a hill with a rover only to realize after 5 minutes of trying that your batteries are on empty.

My theory on mods comes from using mods in other games. If I install too much stuff too soon, I get overwhelmed by it all. Too much freedom in a sandbox game kills the game for me. The features of the game need to expand as my skill set expands. I have a single mod now (engineer), but I anticipate the mod list growing as my skill improves and I've exhausted myself of interesting missions in the stock game. Mods are certainly not the dark side!

I didn't know the abort button existed until two weeks ago. I used to rapidly stage my rocket until the chute came out. I actually saved more Kerbals doing that than using the fancy escape tower and the abort key...

I've done this one multiple times, even after learning to double check that I've added all the essentials. The worst is when it's an unmanned mission. I once had the good fortune of having a bit of fuel left to return a probe to Kerbin and crash land it using the remaining fuel.

I came here to post this video. It's a very personal song to me as it also happens to be my day job.