Pax Kerbana

This is an important topic, I hope Squad pays attention to this. Career mode is my only real gripe of the game. Not to say the game isn't awesome, because it is. It just isn't quite finished. Contracts: Keep the current structure, its okay. Reduce the amount of tourist contracts, especially for early game. Reduce significantly the amount of rescue contracts. These are kinda foolish, especially in the amount offered. I like that they added the "expand" contracts. Keep the ridiculous descriptions, it's nicely Kerbal. Tech: Tech structure NEEDS to be revamped, that is I think, what people are really complaining about in regards to career. Tech should be gained by experience using associated parts. For example: using solid boosters accumulate hidden points, the more a player uses them, the sooner "new tech" is developed. Tech usage experience can be "bought" for a significant amount of money. Lets say the player doesn't want to mess around with Fleas to develop enough experience to research the Kickback. They could purchase a development program for say, 5-10 times the normal development cost. Tech should be developed over time. Researching a part isn't instantaneous, it must be selected and funded over time. I do like the ability to specialize down one path, this should be retained. I suggest Squad play the excellent, excellent, Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. The way that game does tech would work great for KSP. In the game, a player can research down a tree, but also force research if needed. They are also given tech that just suddenly "develops" based on existing tech and relative factors IIRC. Alpha Centauri, although ancient at this point, is still an excellent game. Cost Structure: All I'm gonna say on this is that cost needs to be seriously looked at. Kerbals cost WAY too much. This one thing alone has single-highhandedly killed career for me. Abusing rescue missions to get free slaves "Kerbals" is not an answer to an unbalanced cost structure. Okay, maybe a second thing, a suggestion. Costs should be one-time AND time dependent. Down payment on a research program, then funded for 1 year before you can try a prototype part. Good Kerbals get a signing bonus and a yearly salary, for a 10-year contract. Death settlements perhaps. Also, loans are a thing.

+1 to GoSlash27. Pax's Rules: 0) If it doesn't look right, it isn't. 1) Kerbal life shall be respected... no risky missions (except for BA test pilots... and Jeb... and Val). 2) All craft shall have abundance of space for occupants and "snacks," based on mission type. 3a) Keep everything as small and light as possible for designated mission. 3b) Cost is always a concern, even in sandbox. 4) Launchers shall be functional AND elegant, "realistic" form. 5a) Fuel hoses shall be used sparingly, no asparagus staging. 5b) Large boosters may feed a core craft, a la the space shuttle. 6) Only "empty" parts may clip in "full" parts. A tank may clip into a structural adapter or nosecone, but a tank cannot clip into another tank or hab module. 7) Everything leaving Kerbin must have redundant com systems. 8) Probes before Kerbals. 9) Un-exploded Kerbals always come home. 10) Stock (because if I open the mod-can, I will have negative free time).

820 hours? Do you boast after having 3 beers? I envy your completion of KSP.

The work of NASA, no doubt. I bet this particular letter took 4X as long and cost 10X more than budget, not to mention being canceled once and re-prioritized several times.

Oh yes, it can be done. I'm doing it now in a LV-N free game. Trick is to use the regular clamp-o-trons along the length of the ship. This is the best way to deal with the issue of engine thrust shaking or breaking the ship. For example, 2 sets of 4, one at the top of a resusable core and the other at the bottom, will allow four radial "boosters" that can be detached in pairs. Trying to build a modular ship axially is a recipe for spagetti and ship compaction...

Fatty Boom Boom?

Do not insult my Mk1-2! I lovingly haul that thing around the Kerbol system!

Well think about it in terms of KSP, you can leave Kerbin orbit from either: accelerating to a high velocity, creating an elliptical orbit with large apopsis, creating a large circular orbit and increasing velocity, or any in between. It boils down to exceeding escape velocity and what distance you are away from the planet. My understanding is that the Hermes is basically a big ship for traditional transfers. It had enough delta V to enter orbit at destination. The burn time was continuous because they had very low TWR to work with but massive ISP. The Mars flyby they pull is more akin to the Aldrin "Cycler" concept. Basically the Hermes being a very inefficient method to get to Mars, comfort and ion propulsion notwithstanding.

Seems to be getting deleted as debris, turn on persistent debris. The game will re-classify the craft at every stage separation I believe.

They are pretty much the exclusive engine for landing base modules as I design the lander to decouple and shoot off to a fiery oblivion.

All that is true and stuff, but the reason I like being addicted to KSP is that it's saved me a lot of money the past few years. Keeps me from picking up random expensive hobbies...

Good luck with that man! I just finished assembly of a transport ship with a dry mass of 22t and wet mass of 202t... Just the first stage fuel modules cost 225k to high orbit. What I'm doing is way different than you but I'm sure you'll need lots of root. I can't see doing what you're proposing for less than 200k...

If its big enough you could plunge deep into the atmosphere and then blast off into space at the last second. You probably won't be able to resist the massive gravity of Eve and end blowing up on the surface, splattering parts all over the celestial body. Well that's all I got. I would have more but unfortunately Eve isn't an analog for Uranus.

Meh. When you turn out a fully functional fuel depot with docked tanks, 18k/23k fuel/ox and 5k RCS, with 4 craft useable docking ports (plus station tug port), station tug, 6 gigantors, and keep it aesthetically pleasing and modular, while maximizing functionally, at less than 100 parts, then you'll have a challenge. Must include lighting for all ports, responsive handling, probe core, and dedicated crew transfer facility. Must also be able to change orbit effectively using the tug at full thrust (stability issue, not TWR).

Not at all. I build amazingly awesome things like a complex base system in sandbox but then never do anything with it. That's why I play career almost exclusively. Unless I get the urge to build a badS space plane that looks like a real life one might that can circumnavigate Kerbin altitude 25km at 1400m/s or punch to space. Then I might go to sandbox for a few hours. I love this game.

Kessler Syndrome is defined by the equation XGh/Do=F, where: Do: Debris Gh: GPU speed (MHz) X: Ram coeificient and F is the machine defined FPS that results in sub-par game performance.

Well it depends on how you want to spend your time. In 0.90 I had a station that was constructed in 10 launches that had 6+ orange tanks worth of fuel plus 4000 mono. I built it in small launches as funds allowed and had the lifters such that a full tank was delivered with each launch. For your case, with an existing but empty station, I see two possibilities for "fuel RFN": 1) Small, cheap launchers consisting of a liquid core stage and lots of cheap SRBs. This wil allow you to use the station as cheap as possible and fuel as you go. The nice thing about this is if you make a point to rendezvous mission ship lifters before leaving Kerbin, you can offload extra circulation stage fuel before separation and deorbit. 2) Launch I big tanker and maneuver the station to rendezvous with it. There really likey isn't a need for this unless your sending the whole station somewhere or just want your tanks to be full. Mining is okay but at the far end of the tech tree, besides I like sending space ships on missions, not digging in the dirt. Besides, Minmus is a boring place, get your fuel from space rocks if you want to mine!

Don't need no separatrons messin up my part count! Keep that finger on the X key, let SRBs flame out and stabilize, kill thrust and stage at same time, hit Ctr and hold until full throttle, coast away. What hurts isn't a little bump, it's the delta velocity between your stages that cause damage, no different the surface impact speed. Equalize the velocity of craft and last stage, then accelerate away! Haven't used separatrons since 0.90... but I have used fleas...

Mk1-2 and cupola do it all for me. Favorite is the 1 man lander can but the IVA is not suitable for a ship. A tug not so bad but I've had too many whoops with them.

Ahh a generator, what a good idea. Maybe limited to use on planets only (for a variety of reasons) that would keep the fuel cell relevant. Then we could have methane-electric hybrid rovers! As for make, I'm a Pontiac guy myself, but alas I must admit that carburetors have no place in a space program (mostly due to an assumed methane fuel analog). Maybe the Kerbal engine company founder can be Poncho Kerman? What a great name for a Kerbal!

Piston engines are excellent if not for anything except reliability. Mars (& Duna) rovers should have them absolutely. The problem with KSP is that the existing wheels are too powerful and there is a whole slew of parts require before we could make good use of them. I am a big believer of piston engines belonging in KSP. Batteries in this game are waaayy too light. Electricity should not be so easy to store. That's what the dinosaurs made hydrocarbons for!

Vernor engines? Really? Those things are awesome. Try lining the back side of a wing with them and then let me know what you think. Also sometimes they are really useful... Especially for craft that you don't want to add mono tanks to or large craft. Maybe you're not building big enough? They're also useful as radially attached "brakes" on landers with weak TWR or suicide burn insurance... I'll set them to the brake group and slow descent at the last minute. The separators have twice the force and can be used also when launching multiple probes where orientation changes for staging or using free nodes on other parts. Example engine nozzle to engine nozzle or a probe mounted to a station girder end.

Although not actively breaking the universe, I've learned to love a NAn kraken attack, the same way natural disasters are secretly thrilling!

You can thank the mods for that! Regarding the probability of ... ratios, all I can say is that for anyone to defend a 100% single ... result for any installation, it's a little ridiculous. But now we have many instances of that. With or without mods isn't really the issue. This shouldn't be happening, I cannot understand how a mod could cause this or that mods should be used as an excuse. When I first saw all the rescuees were female I thought, "meh, eventually some male rescue contracts will appears." Such is not the case. While we're on the subject tho, while Squad is fixing this, can you please reduce the cost of new Kerbal hires to AT LEAST 10% and remove the cumulative hiring costs?! The current cost and structure is ridiculous. I propose having Tier 0 applicants be cheap and come with no skills. As the Astronaut Complex is upgraded, applicants start with 1 star for Tier 1 and 2 stars for Tier 2. Their cost to hire would increase respectively. That would make a lot more sense. Alternatively, or maybe in addition too, the hire cost could be based on stats such as stupid ones cost much less and badS ones might be 3x the average cost, because you know, they're cowboys (or gals)!

I have noticed that the center of lift does not behave the same for part orientation as it did pre-1.0, which is to be expected. My question is how does changing the part orientation affect lift and drag now? It used to be a wing's leading edge produced the same lift if facing forward as the normal orientation would. This appears to still be the case. What isn't clear is if the wing provides any lift if facing the edge forward. It seems to in the current model whereas it would not produce any in the old model. Does anyone know exactly how the lift force is calculated now? I'll give three examples that would illustrate what I mean. 1) Delta wing rotated 90 degrees so that the tip of the wing faces forward. 2) Mk2 fuselage rotated 90 degrees so that the width is vertical, the flat side facing down. 3) Mk2 fuselage rotated 90 degrees so that the width is horizontal, the flat edge facing forward. I would expect that in case #1 the old style delta produces the same lift as if in its normal orientation while the heavy delta would produce some fraction of lift compared to normal orientation. For case #2, I would expect that the fuselage would produce lift force perpendicular to the airstream and case #3 would not generate any lift although maybe it should. Can anyone confirm or deny?