Hotel26

Very related. I (desperately) don't want to be the oldest KSP player! So please check out this link: The only catch is "do you play KSP every week?". If so, you are qualified to sport the "Respect Your Elders" badge (why would you want it?)!

This is a fair criticism, I will readily admit. I hadn't intended it as such, but reflecting on it objectively, it was. I'm going to stand by my words, but don't take that personally. I have had enough of the KSP2 debacle. And, speaking of self-reflection, the wailing throng doesn't seem to understand nor care about the negative impact upon others, nor, more importantly, on T2 management. It very much looks like a lost cause (customer satisfaction), doesn't it? Live long and prosper.

The problem is that you are upset about something. The most effective (only) solution is to make the internal change within yourself to not be upset about whatever you are upset about. Seriously. What might help you understand is that some people, just a few, knew in advance, from experience, that KSP2 was a very bad idea. So this is a self-inflicted wound. Also helpful might be the observation (opinion) that I just cannot think of any other industry that runs this way vis-a-vis the paying customer. Uusally, the protocol is that "we, the company, make our best guess as what might please the customer, then we make it and offer it for sale, and then they don't buy it if they don't want it"[1]. Couldn't be simpler. So, what is it exactly that is "wrong" with the games industry? Well, I will venture a guess: 'kidz'. They want what they want and they hold their breath waiting and then scream when they don't get it. Well, this can't be right. Most of the computer games clientele are over the age of 18. (Some are even 68 until next month.) And games, though perenially associated with 'kidz' (who are generally not 'serious' people) are, in actual fact, quite very serious intellectual components of human culture and have been since the first stones got chipped and polished into Go stones. So the conclusion I am making is that there seem to be now a preponderance of very maturity-stunted people in the games community: adultz who are still kidz. Normally, getting older is the conventional solution to this difficulty, but it must be something in the water now... Please yourself, but I've been hoping for years now KSP2 (a very bad idea) would die so the wailing would stop, but now it appears that we have to have 3 years of wailing about the demise of KSP2? A Demise Which Has Not Even Yet Been Announced. [1] remember too that "verbal contracts are not worth the paper they are written on". Caveat emptor.

Spaceport: Old Smokey (OLD) Download: Old Smokey to ./GameData/<your name>/Airports/Old\ Smokey.zip and unzip. Body: Eve Lat: 0.7606S Long: 168.1730E Elev: 12,000m Description: High-altitude LEO launch point Spaceport. Notes: Currently, the Kryptonite[1] space plane is able to fly to LEO from and return to this spaceport. [1] certified but yet to be imminently published. It looks something like the below but is yet in a very provisional state. Needs a lot more work, but provides the basic test platform for first usage of Kryptonite.

Yes, let's call it KSP3. Because that is how much better it is going to be. This time.

Only if the fans[1] are ready to be quiet which won't happen until Sol goes nova red giant nova[1]... ^^^^^^^^ not what I typed [1] nova, as in "never" [2] fanatics, lunatics, spoiled brats [3] and hate to break it to today's "professional software engineers" but there is no such thing as "technical debt [wink wink]". That's just what you say to hoodwink your managers into letting you have your green field liquid dream

Just completed testing on Kryptonite IIb and ready to certify. After the de-orbit deceleration, Kryptonite is more than happy to fly backwards to the target (Old Smokey, seen in the background) before the final "flip-around" maneuver. Acting upon advice from @Lt_Duckweed, all-up mass has been reduced from 230t to 192t. KerbalX is having conniptions at the moment, but I will publish this as soon as I can. Here is the very preliminary Old Smokey spaceport.

"Moneypenny! Get me the chief of Acme Rocket Ejection Seat Corp on the blower! NOW!!!" SQUUAD!! HEAD COUNT. SOUNDDD OFF!! Well, on the bright side: at least I still haven't killed any kerbals today... Now fitting a new & improved version of the rocket ejection seat...

I've been hard at work on my Eve SSTO project. The testing is rigorous and re-entry, deceleration and then the "flip-around" maneuver is hard. Have had several flights now in which the "flip-around" has caused an inflight break-up. So we've lost no brave kerbals because all 7 in each of 3 flights (Mk2 capsule plus Hitchhiker) have been able to bale out and congregate together on the ground, positioning themselves in the form of an 'H', for "Help!". Which gave me an idea for a recreational project, in order to take a break. Here follows the start of: Space Troop "Keeping You Safe 7x6!" Currently just a small troop size of 8 kerbals, but will expand to a platoon of 24. Each troop ship goes into a 60-degree orbit. Then the long wait in space with nothing to do. When trouble does break out in some location on the globe, the nearest ship goes into de-orbit, then the glide phase, then jettisons its fairing and disperses its troop via rocket-boosted ejection seats, triggered simultaneously. The squad leader goes into a low opening tuck, picks the landing spot. The others open at 5km AGL and then maneuver to land at their leader's side. Weapons are unslung and the radio kerb phones in: "Blue Squad, ready for action", etc. Points are given for tightness of the landing grouping as well as shortest time to form up after the squad leader's touch-down.

Huge milestone to report! @Lt_Duckweed most graciously ran a keen eye over my Kryptonite machine and made a series of key suggestions. In addition, he supplied his version, Kryptonite 8, which I just test-flew to LEO!!! 96x94 km with 157 m/s in the tank. I'm going to spend tomorrow studying his run-down in detail as I know I am going to learn immensely from it. I want to also express gratitude again to @Aelfhe1m for his ideas and assistance. This, together with Lt_Duckweed's insight have made this a Joint Project and very much fun. I will be publishing this craft at some point soon, along with publishing the Old Smokey spaceport to the Kerbal Konstructs Airport Exchange. Stay tuned here for those.

I am developing a new spaceport on Eve, called Old Smokey. It's a 12km-high flat-top, more than 3x3km for launch/landing field. Also, an SSTO , Kryptonite (7), to shuttle up to 7 kerbals between Eve and LEO. Also, an apoaptic intercept/rescue ship called Evolution. I just attempted a return from LEO directly to Old Smokey Spaceport. Here's the photo shoot: And the view of the launch ramp: The launch ramp is going to be integrated back onto the main field using a real 20-degree rock incline under the ramp for support -- eliminating the ESE tower. (Thanks to @Aelfhe1m for suggesting a mechanism for doing this!) Here's a shot of Evolution: It's based on "Catch-Net" by @Tony Swallow. 18,000kN.

And I like the way you think! (I will figure out the "custom height map" as it will have "other applications" for my space program.) When I am done, I will publish Old Smokey (the spaceport, including the map decals) in Kerbal Konstructs Airport Exchange so that other intrepid pilots can feel the excitement terror... And Kryptonite, of course, in KerbalX. Meanwhile, Kryptonite 5 has shed some mass/drag. I implemented the jettisonable crew section. (It's Soviet-style: bale out when low & slow enough.)

Thanks for the suggestion. I had thought I had just succeeded but inspecting the screenshot closely the orbital figures were 93,822 x 86,612 m. It looks doable now, though... [click + arrows = slideshow] Just short.

A progress report: almost "square". Suborbital: 92 x -59 km. Came very close, with inexpert handling of the controls. So this vehicle, Kryptonite 3, is probably up to the job. Payload: a Mk-2 capsule and a Hitchhiker for a total of 7 kerbals. Returning to the surface requires something like a half fuel-load, which means that a failed ascent is going to be fatal -- unless some solid booster emergency system can reliably give the crew sections a final "kick".

Have you ever looked at MKS? ...Kolonisation Congratulations on your achievements and all the enjoyment and entertainment you gained from KSP!!

This is very helpful -- exactly what I was looking for, too. Thank you, KB. I think, before I go any further, I will drop the elevation of Old Smokey to an even 12km. Even if transport planes need to get some Vector assist to make it there from "sea level", it would be easily practicable. Yes, I think this looks more "plausible"...

Not before it runs on Linux. Show-stopper.

For the record, the following were/are inspirational: How to build and pilot your own EVE SSTO!!! Leave Nothing Behind - EVE SSTS - Success! It kind of grows on you!...

Ignoring the "thing" in the middle: on its left, you can see Mauve Mountain, which has an airport elevation of 6415m. On its right: you can see a flat, square airfield, Eva Firma, which is 5x5 km and elevation 3100m. (No facilites as yet.) Which brings us back to the monstrosity in the centre: Old Smokey. A little over 3x3 km square, it accommodates a 3 km ruway and has an elevation of 20km. You can see the curvature of Eve from it, looking over the edge; and the sky is completely black, but no stars! From a distance, too, it does look like a Squad 'monolith'... [albeit unnaturally elongated. ] So we know that the "state of the art" is to use propellers to get as high as possible and then single-stage rocket power to go to orbit, delivering a single kerbal with perhaps a packet of smokes. I guesstimated that propellers might get one somewhere close to 20km, before kicking in the rockets. (I figure if it's too high, we'll just bulldoze some of it over the side. ) So, we don't know what the next part of the plan is. It would be good to get an ore loading measurement on top of 'Old Smokey'. So any rocket vehicle that can get from 20km to 90km on Eve, ought to be able to fuel up at Eve Firma and then climb to and land on Old Smokey. Then refuel. It's an SSTO[2], which signifies "Single-Stage, Take-Off twice". Alternatively, a super-charged passenger prop aircraft can ferry pax to the top of Old Smokey and then the SSTO[2] craft can simply ascend to orbit from Old Smokey and return to same. It just has to have wings. Which will be the other side of the too-low (to orbit) equation. How well will wings fly (glide) at 20km on Eve (too-high)? OK, so we still have a lot of work to do. Just call this then a mad, mad, mad, deluded scientific/engineering experiment. As mentioned earlier, my KSC Kommand believes that kerbonnel is the only reasonable "export" from Eve. Not fuel, not equipment; not even science (which can be tele-transferred (albeit for lower points)). 8-10 out at a time would be the jackpot.

On long interplanetary voyages, there is not a lot to do except gaze out and ponder how small the Kerbolar system is, embedded as it is, in a vast panoply of an artificial "sky box" [whatever that is]. Does this look familiar to you? Big Dipper It looks to me like a French Legionnaire cap... but YMMV. Some Kerbals I know say it is a saucepan. Or a Big Dipper (ladle). So then, if you are a Sky Watcher, here is the thread for you to waste while away some productive time as you journey across the vast interstitial space... If you see a distinctive 'constellation', post here in this thread as an "entry". If someone else finds it, and posts a similar image except including a slightly wider area (sufficient to be validated by the original finder), a link to your image gets posted here (OP) in the index, listing the Constellation Name, Discoverer and Validator. As well as the Constellation Index here, there will be a Leaderboard for Discoverers (1 point each validated post) and Validators (2 points once confirmed), as well as Aggregate. (No, you cannot Discover your own Post; but you already knew that.) Constellation Discoverer Validator Big Dipper Hotel26 -none- Have fun!

Well, here's a square island I built on Kerbin at location 70W on the equator about 50 klicks downrange from KSC: Same for Eve, except it would be purple and "toad-ugly".

Yes, CSV was a typical Intermediate Language; and 'Export' used to be known as 'Compile'. With Commas most often used in the western hemisphere, whereas the Soviet Union and Friends used Tabs, preventing code interchangeability, for obvious reasons of national security. [You might have known of it as '3PT']

And even closer to CSV!

I think this is brilliant! Congratulations. I knew this was theoretically possible and have been waiting years to see a realization of it. Is there any chance of you posting your component craft for study, somewhere like e.g. KerbalX? Kudos!

Just discovered this same thing myself. 3x astelets. Nope, now there's 4... How very dreslicious!