Little Green Mensch

This all looks fantastic so far, and I am quite looking forward to seeing the project unfold.

My impression was that KSP is about iterative design, the hilarity of kabooms, and moar boosters/struts. That said, there's really no reason -not- to have a delta-v readout in the game. Presumably, like the engineer's report that was added in 1.0, players that don't want to use it can hide the UI and ignore it. A transfer window and alarm clock should also be in the stock game - it's hard to run multiple missions otherwise. While, yes, everyone can "do the math" longhand (or via a spreadsheet, for true sophisticates), forcing them to do so adds nothing to gameplay.

Any thoughts of adding a lightship engine? http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/surfaceorbit.php#id--Laser_Launch--Lightcraft Basically, there's a big parabolic mirror with waist vents to allow air in; the mirror is then shot by a pulsed laser, causing the air to superheat into plasma, propelling the launch vehicle forward. When the laser isn't firing, more air flows in through the waist vents. Admittedly, I have no idea how you would implement the ground-based laser in KSP, but it seems like a neat, futuristic solution for heavy lift (since your boost stage is basically just a giant mirror).

Nuclear aerospike SSTOs: rocketry the way God and Robert Heinlein intended. Really looking forward to the next iteration/release of Kerbal Atomics, many thanks @Nertea for your many stellar modding contributions to KSP.

Loosely based on Rune's Longsword orange tank lifter: as soon as I can figure how to keep the large landing gear from falling off the bottom on the runway, this thing will even be able to land, at which point I'll attach the craft file. It works well with FAR, and is decently stable, save for a bit of Dutch roll and sideslipping as it gets higher in the atmosphere, which is tolerable as long as you use the flight aids. I haven't tried it out in stock, but expect it'll handle similarly (although stock doesn't include FAR's intake ducting). Because it has a low-ish TWR (~.5 on take-off), it won't break the sound barrier in level flight. I could probably tweak the elevons to give it more control authority, but since it makes orbit decently well... It has 750 monoprop and eight block thrusters for rendezvous and keeping the nose up on re-entry, as well as an RGU tucked in front of the monoprop tank.

Rockets are definitely faster, but the challenge of designing a spaceplane is fun, and they look nifty in orbit. I'm not sure how much of a cost difference there is, but being able to land at KSC with all (or most) of your parts is helpful in career mode, and, for recovery missions, a great big cargo bay that can land on the runway is pretty handy, too. Insofar as spaceplanes are "cheating"... Kerbin is an impossibly tiny planet peopled by large-headed, bulgy-eyed, green-skinned pyromaniacs who all live on the same equatorial peninsula, for some reason. Like rockets in KSP, spaceplanes have a high dry weight and use engines which would be woefully underpowered for the real world. They're certainly not playing the game on easy mode, and, if you use FAR, you gain a couple more layers of challenge from aerodynamic disassembly and mach effects. Also, even in the real world, people haven't given up on spaceplanes. The RAPIER is based on a real-world concept, after all, and the U.S. Air Force is still playing around with the X-37.