Wanderfound

While I don't disagree with your overall point, my nitpicky side is compelled to point out that it's entirely doable to hit orbit with your second or third launch in career mode; once you have any sort of LFO engine and tank, you're good to go. And as for the altitude ceiling of basic jet aircraft... But yes, some smoothing of the initial learning gradient in regards to the interface wouldn't hurt.

Yup, I'm not bothering with nuFAR until the official release. I hate designing when I don't know if the problems are caused by design or bugs.

Another demo: Kerbodyne Triskenne. Back to the good old days. Craft file at https://www.dropbox.com/s/re2mmiimpcy5d55/Kerbodyne%20Triskenne.craft?dl=0

Not designed to work with it; there used to be a section in the BTSM OP that specifically advised against FAR. Now it seems to have been edited to "don't use anything except DRE with BTSM". See Flowerchild's assorted comments at http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/search.php?searchid=5178658

Kerbodyne Triskenne. Back to the good old days. Craft file at https://www.dropbox.com/s/re2mmiimpcy5d55/Kerbodyne%20Triskenne.craft?dl=0

Kerbodyne Triskenne. Back to the good old days. Craft file at https://www.dropbox.com/s/re2mmiimpcy5d55/Kerbodyne%20Triskenne.craft?dl=0

Any of y'all been able to get E.V.E. to work properly in 1.0.2? I get crashes with the HR pack, and massive graphic glitches with the LR version.

BTSM is appealing, but the lack of FAR-compatability makes it a non-starter, unfortunately.

Manned Mars missions are not going to happen any time in the forseeable future. There's just no sensible reason to do it apart from "it's cool". Robotic explorers, yes, boots and flags, no. Worth the read as a reality check: http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2007/06/the_high_frontier_redux.html

Or: Landing pad with a claw mounted on something bendy, with some landing legs as actuators to push it into position when necessary. Or just put the claw face-up in the middle of the pad and land directly on it.

You only need the building upgrade for spacewalks; you can EVA on Kerbin by default. Surface samples require an upgrade, although I'm not sure if it's Astro Complex or R&D.

There's a price to pay for the multi-function: if you consider them just as intakes or just as LF tanks, they're heavy and expensive for what they provide compared to normal intakes and tanks. But when you put it together and add the heatsink property, they can become worthwhile.

They are intakes (stack-mounted, but radial-drawing: they don't need to be at the front of the stack), LF tanks and heat sinks.

As with the nacelles, intercoolers combine a bit of intake with a bit of LF. What's new, however, is that the intercoolers appear to have extremely high heat tolerance, so they make for very good radiators and insulators.

Identical designs, apart from swapping the central engine from a Turbo to a RAPIER. Turbo wins on this run, but it's hard to tell how much of that is due to piloting.

Ramscoop vs Shock Cone: Shock Cones weigh more and suck slightly less air. But they're lower drag and much more heat tolerant. The intercoolers appear to actually live up to their name, too. Notice how the warning bars are showing on the wings and engines, but not the intercoolers, despite all of them being at a similar temperature:

Two Thuds and a basic jet. All low-tech parts, designed for one suborbital hop or multiple boosts to 20,000m. For actual spaceplanes, see http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/90747-Kerbodyne-SSTO-Division-Omnibus-Thread?p=1897125&viewfull=1#post1897125 and http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/90747-Kerbodyne-SSTO-Division-Omnibus-Thread?p=1877990&viewfull=1#post1877990

Don't light the rockets until you've got as much altitude as possible from the jet, and climb steeply while the rockets are running.

They're very heat-resistant. Notice how wings, engines and intercoolers are all yellow, but only the coolers are missing the warning bar:

I'm assuming that the 1,500m/s is what's left in your tanks after the climb to LKO; refuel at Minmus and you should have several thousand to play with, plus you can stop for further top-ups at any planet you pass along the way.

If you can get 1,500m/s ÃŽâ€V plus a mining rig into LKO, you can go anywhere. And even the big ISRU parts will fit inside a Mk3 cargo bay...

I'm about to go to bed, so I can't do it myself right now, but does anyone feel like doing a comparison between a RAPIER/Turbo/RAPIER ship and an identical craft with the central turbo replaced by a third RAPIER? Craft file at https://www.dropbox.com/s/ga8orb9xrpxgk21/Kerbodyne%20Triske.craft?dl=0

You'd likely get some useful information from this thread: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/118433-Quick-tip-for-early-career-mode-science?p=1907740#post1907740 ...and the later parts of this one: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/118977-Is-Normal-career-mode-too-hard?p=1906547#post1906547

The difficulty with relying on just a pair of RAPIERs during the ascent is that you're likely to have trouble punching through the sound barrier unless it's a very lightweight ship; the new RAPIERs have a rather significant flat spot in their power curve, right in the transsonic range. OTOH, a Turbojet/LV-909 ship can be made to work. My version was a small Mk1 with a single Turbo and two 909's, though.

Very much suborbital; it's designed to hit space once, or 20,000m a few times (for surveys and part testing). Whack a probe core in there and it'd work well as a suborbital tourist carrier.