MadChris48

Yesterday I launched a ship headed to the Joolian system. Unmanned probe. Did my usual launch thing and when I got to the appropriate segment of the launch i opened the map view to drop a maneuver node. That's when I noticed the icon representing a probe on the orbit track was missing. Thought this was kinda weird, but went ahead a circularized. Popped out of map view, and then went to the Space Center via button at top of the HUD. When I went to the Tracking Station, there was no probe in orbit. Then I started testing, and noticed that when launching any unmanned probe the vessel has no icon in the map view (even when sitting on the launch pad), and if i get it to orbit it will not persist after going back to the Space Center. I even installed Remote Tech to try and spur some life back into the probes. With RT installed, I could see the signal line to the vessel, but there was no icon present on the orbit track and the vessel would not persist after returning to the Space Center. Crew carrying capable vessels are unaffected. I tested with both a occupied vessel and an unoccupied vessel controlled by a probe core. They have the appropriate icons and persist after orbital insertion. I'm confused as to what happened and it puts a huge damper on my game to not be able to launch unmanned vessels. Any ideas?

I'm excited to see what you've come up with.

You still need to start with a pod as a seat can't hold a kerbal straight out of the VAB. Less than 1000, huh? Bold claims, let's see you do it!!

Thruth be told, I had some extra dV after I made my return burn so I'm sure you could drop enough fuel out of the craft to get it under 6k. But I'll leave that for someone else to do so they have something to beat. -To Space!

Its going to be almost impossible to ensure everyone is playing exactly 42 minutes (i see what you did there). You're on the right track though. Since time is tracked in game and always starts at day 0, you should make this challenge in kerbal time, not real time, to make it precisely measurable. Say, 42 Kerbin days to see how far you can advance your program. I think that would be a better metric to run a challenge of this nature. Just my .02

Here's an 'entry' (caveat quotes). Land and return. 6087 funds in the VAB , 4869.6 with the return refund. Its not a truly vanilla install as I have Kerbal Engineer, but I wasn't going to remove that just for this. If it doesn't earn me a badge its all good, I just enjoyed the challenge. Plenty of misson photos, VAB and F3 screenshots. that was a fun one to do!

I tried that , but I think after I exited and restarted the game the quicksave I had was lost.

So what had happened was: sent Valentina to Jool. I'm in the Tracking Center screen time warping to the intercept. Just before she enters Jool SOI I click the fly the ship button. In the midst of it switching to/loading the ship I press 'M' to bring up the orbital map. The ship never loads, and all I see are the sun and stars (and HUD of course). so then, I press ESC and head back to the Space Center. Now, back at Kerbin, the terrain didn't load and I can see the solar system where I should be seeing land and ocean, I'm pretty sure the buildings loaded (can't fully recall. its late, and I'm getting tired). Anyways, I quit the game, and load it back up. Only now Valentina is missing. No ship in tracking station, she just...disappeared. It really sucks cause I pride my Space Program on not losing the main Kerbals, and secondly, Jool is a long trip. le sigh. Anyone else had this happen to them yet? Any chance I could load some previous quicksave or something to resurrect her? I'm really not keen on restarting my career over this. I'm pretty bummed and gonna call it a night. Thanks for any input.

it's mostly solid. Since I modeled the pieces individually there is empty space inside the decoupler. Other than that, its a solid piece (engine nozzle is shelled as well). We used a fairly large fill hatch for it, so it isn't heavy at all. In fact, it's surprisingly light.

I modeled a decoupler with this ship. It's just that since we printed it horizontally a lot of the detail was lost (I even went so far as to model the triangle and caution lines in the decoupler but those details never came out in the horizontal print). The next go round will definitely be individual pieces that can snap together. Eventually I want to model more parts and have them all be modular so I can build any type of ship I want.

That's an awesome idea, thanks!

Yeah, I've thought about coloring it (I've got some model painting skills under my belt). I think if we were to print it again it would be in its individual pieces, and I'd design some interlocking mechanism to snap the parts together.

I'm fortunate enough to have access to a 3D printer at my job. I've recently started doing some 3D modeling and thought it would be really fun to model a Kerbal ship. The first time we printed it we tried it vertically. It was the first time we'd tried to print anything that tall the first print fell over about half way through (lesson learned, moar legs!). Second time we printed it horizontally. Consequently, the model suffered some detail loss and isn't quite as clean of a print as it could be, but it's still nice to be holding it in my hands. It's not a perfect model, but I may get another go at printing it; at which time it could get some revisions. It was modeled in 123D Design from Autodesk (free app), in 4 parts (engine, fuel tank, decoupler, command pod/parachute), all parts were imported and snapped together, and then printed in one piece. It now lives in the office as example for visitors (and my viewing pleasure).

No, there should be another vector to move along, and OP put it pretty well. Looking for a 'head over heels' rotational control. I've also wanted this control vector as well. I think you can turn off the kerbal orienting to the camera automatically but it can be a little difficult to keep em under control that way and it don't really give the desired effect.

Capture an asteroid. Land it on Kerbin.

Enhanced Navball Mod EDIT: Ninja'd!

When I make stock fairings I radially attach i-beams to a decoupler, point them up, and then attach structural plates. You can play with the symmetry to get them to look nice.

Yes, this!

Career; modded. Decided to try out more mods for the first time with this release. Learning FAR has been... different. RT2 makes creating satellite constellations fun and useful. Kerbal Engineer is awesome for seeing those 'under the hood' stats. EVE makes everything beautiful.

upper middleweight entry: , payload 99452kg = 109.627 tons, lifter costs $315400. 315400/109.627 = $2877.03/ton build in VAB, w/flight engineer stats http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=292906732 just before lifter separation, w/flight engineer stats http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=292906638 payload in orbit, w/flight engineer stats http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=292906668

I turned off quicksaving\quickloading, and revert to launch pad or VAB. all launches final. unfortunately i've already lost the main three: Jeb, Bill, and Bob. Initial thoughts: Some of the contracts can be weird, and consequently can be tough (and hard to do multiple contracts in a single flight). testing a large booster in orbit, for example. or one of my first missions, which i still haven't completed, is something like testing the small SRB (not sepratron) at an alt between 2500 and 6500km but at a decent clip of 380m/s plus. Both of which are pretty difficult with low tech early in career. Needless to say, playing this 'Hardcore' mode has been tough and utterly unforgiving. It's the worst feeling watching Jeb plummet to his death knowing reverting or quickloading can't save you. Or trying to get some mission done, coming up short, and having to watch it land without having done a damn thing. Definitely tougher, makes you plan more, and favors efficient building. The challenges are great, but the rewards are oh so tasty. P.S. the only mod i had installed still seems to work fine with the update, and adds a bit more of a challenge/realism. Remote Tech 2.

Hi, my name is Chris and I'm a Kerbaholic. God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, The courage to change the things I can, And wisdom to know the difference. Thanks. P.S. My girlfriend calls this the 'space game', and I love her for it.

If you are going for maximum science then a manned mission is the way to go. The crew and EVA reports alone make the manned science mission gains well worth it. That said, there is way more science in the Kerbol system than the tech tree can support, so manned missions aren't needed for anywhere really (unless you want the crew/eva reports). It's a little easier to design a probe vs manned lander, but not there isn't very much difference. Also, there is a huge amount of satisfaction of sending a Kerbal to another body, doing all the fun stuff there, and then bringing him home.

Another really useful tip to achieve the most efficient landings is to place a maneuver node right near the surface of Mun (or wherever) and pull the retrograde marker to kill all your velocity. This will give you a maneuver of the most efficient burn to land.