Hodari

By itself, just hiding info wouldn't affect gameplay much, though it might allow for better role-playing for people who are into that sort of thing. It would make far more sense though if other stuff was added along with it though. For example, encounter info shown in the tracking station could be slightly off until you perform an actual fly-by of the planet. EVA's on a planet or in its atmosphere could be prohibited until you've sent a probe to do an atmospheric analysis(need to make sure your space suit will be able to handle it). A pressure scan from within the atmosphere would allow parachutes to be set for the proper deployment height/speed. And entirely new features could also be added that would depend on you having certain knowledge about the world you are trying to land on. If they want to prevent people from simply being able to look up the relevant data, some of these values could also be randomized for each new game. So yeah, by itself, it doesn't add much, but it does open up a lot of options.

Once you have your initial encounter, try doing very small maneuvers in each direction(prograde, retrograde, normal/anti-normal, radial/anti-radial) and keep adjusting until you get closer. If you still can't get close enoguh, try again a bit later on your approach to the planet when you're coming from a different angle and see if that helps. Also, you can set the target planet as focus and zoom in on that planet in the map view to see exactly what your encounter path will be, then use that to help you adjust it.

I'd say SOME info should be visible, but not all. We might have a rough estimate for the mass of a planet, but landing on it or even just a fly-by would give a much more accurate number. We might know that a planet HAS an atmosphere and even what the main components of it are, but landing there would give more details about how thick that atmosphere is at varying altitudes and what trace gases are there(Great, the planet has ~75% nitrogen and ~25% oxygen, but if there's also cyanide in it, we might want to know before a manned mission.)

Sorry, but no...this wasn't useful at all and neither was your "How to get into orbit tutorial. Both VERY badly oversimplify things and leave out almost all of the relevant information. How do you make a tutorial on not tipping over and have no mention of where to keep your center of mass? Or drag? Or any kind of aerodynamics at all? No mention of using fins? Nothing about when to limit your speed? Not even symmetry? How do you do a tutorial on getting to orbit and not even mention the delta-V requirements or ascent profile?

You see those space centers from Kerbin? They've got curved runways. Curved. Runways. Seriously though, it's only an issue at all when first launching an aircraft and would probably be easier to solve by just having the brakes turned on by default.

"Open the cargo bay doors, HAL." "I'm sorry Jeb. I'm afraid I can't do that." "What's the problem?" "I think you know what the problem is just as well as I do." "What are you talking about, Hal?" "Some idiot attached Kickback boosters to each door."

No, it just shows that YOU have no idea what you are talking about. Come back when you've written a program with a few thousand(let alone the hundreds of thousands or even millions that games take these days) lines of code that works absolutely perfectly. Especially given the complexity of what this game is trying to do, the fact that it has to work on computers with a huge range of specs, different operating systems etc. And then start adding on more features and having to go back and fix any new issues they cause as well. Swordsmithing isn't exactly simple either and it certainly has its own subtleties, but writing a program like this is easily several orders of magnitude more complicated. Not to mention having had a few thousand years for people to work out all of the best techniques and other details. And even then, swords broke all the time.

One other option is to simply split it up into 2 smaller missions. Just because all of the tourists are part of the same contract, doesn't means they HAVE to all go together(and for more complicated itineraries, you don't have to visit all of the destinations for any one tourist in the same mission either). Of course, it may be more cost effective if you can combine them as much as possible, but if you're having trouble designing a ship to handle all of them at once, it's an option., Fins on the bottom of your final stage are definitely what you DON'T want to have. If anything, you can put them upside-down on the TOP of that stage to help keep it pointing retrograde, though you'd want to have a fairing around it and/or larger fins on the bottom of lower stages during launch. This probably shouldn't be needed though. Even on suborbital flights,try to re-enter at a very shallow angle. Especially with something like this, your ascent should probably be almost the same as an actual orbital flight, just skipping the circularization burn at the end. On re-entry, if you're having trouble slowing down enough to open the parachutes, one other thing you can do is: once you have slowed down enough not worry about overheating, turn the ship completely sideways in order to maximize the drag.

Especially given that it's mostly happening during interplanetary missions, is it possible that you're just timewarping past the deadline for the contracts?

You should probably also look at adding at least a few mods that can make the game easier. If nothing else, you should get Kerbal Engineer Redux. Among other things, this will let you see how much delta V a rocket has while you are building it which makes designing them and planning your missions MUCH easier.

Thanks, this was definitely a challenge I've wanted to complete for a while now. And yes, KSS Mk3 was correct for the name.

Not necessarily. At some point, that's just how it works. More fuel means your engines can burn longer, but it also means they have more mass to move and thus each second of thrust is less effective. So you need to start adding more and more fuel to get ever smaller gains in total dV. And at some point, the added mass becomes so much that you will either start LOSING dV by adding more fuel or your TWR will be below 1 and you'll never get off the launchpad in the first place. You can compensate for this by adding more/better engines, but again these will add more mass. So at some point, there is still a practical limit to how much you can lift at one time. Instead of adding more fuel, you're better off trying to do one of three things. Minimize the mass of each stage, especially the upper stages. Even a small amount of mass on the last stage can make a big difference later on since that last stage needs to carry more fuel to compensate, but then that adds to the mass the next stage needs, so IT needs to be bigger which adds to the next stage and so on... Split the payload into two or more smaller modules which can be docked together in orbit or at the destination and launch them separately. Refuel the craft somewhere along the way(again, effectively splitting the mass you need to carry at any one time up).

I'd say for career mode, you should almost always prioritize one of two things: 1. New science experiments or 2. Whatever parts you need in order to get to new biomes in order to run your existing experiments there. The one thing you need to avoid is wasting your points on something that won't help you progress and then leaving yourself with no way to progress further. I'd say you should get the solar panels first with barometer being a very close second. Once you have some way to recharge their batteries, you can send probes to a lot of different places to get the science you need to unlock everything else(not to mention funds from world firsts and opening up a better variety of contracts). With all those biomes now being available, the barometer would then quickly pay for itself. After that, things start to open up a lot more as far as options go. Part count will start to be an issue, so the bigger fuel tanks might help(depending on if you can afford to upgrade the VAB yet. You'll want to be able to land probes and especially kerbals on the Mun and Minmus, so getting landing struts and ladders would also help. Actuators is also a very nice at around this time so you can get funding and free crew members from all the rescue contracts(can skip this if you want to just EVA them over once your rendezvous though).

What about mine?

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader: A single mission which landed on the Mun, then Minmus, then did a fly-by of Duna and Ike, before finally returning to Kerbin. Regular engines were used to get into low Kerbin orbit and do the inclination change, then ion engines only for the rest of the mission. The final landing on Kerbin was especially difficult since the craft design didn't allow for a heat shield and also because the day/night terminator was right near periapsis, so needed to just get a stable but highly elliptical orbit on the first pass and then gradually lower it on the next several orbits before final re-entry. Also kept the craft rapidly spinning during the final descent and ended up only losing the solar panels.

Yeah, it's worth noting that this is around the altitude most commercial aircraft will fly at too.

It has nothing to do with the tech tree(at least not directly anyway). For crewed vehicles, it depends on the experience level of your pilot. For uncrewed probes, it depends on which probe core you use(right click on the probe in the VAB part list to see which functions it offers). Of course, if your pilot is too low a level or your only crew members are engineers or scientists, you can also put a probe on in addition to the command pod in order to gain access to its functions. Either way, use the T key to turn on your SAS and whatever buttons you have access to will show up.

You don't need an equatorial Munar orbit or even to get into an orbit at all(it certainly makes planning easier though). Just fly directly opposite the direction of the Mun's orbit until you're able to escape into Kerbin orbit. You also don't need to worry about the inclination of that orbit unless you're trying to land back at the KSC(and if you're that low on fuel, this is probably the least of your worries). Once you're in Kerbin orbit, jsut burn retrograde at apoapsis as usual in order to drop your periapsis to the desired height As for the stranded craft, if you need to rescue the whole craft, then yeah, refueling rover would probably be the easiest way. If you just want to save the crew, all you have to do is land the rescue craft anywhere nearby and have the crew EVA over. They can also collect any science data first, of course.

If it inflates fast enough, use it to launch stuff from Gilly.

I originally made this for the K-prize challenge, but maybe can use it for this one as well? Only problem is it uses a normal docking port, not the Senior.

Took a few tries to get the landing perfect, but finally made it! Payload was a full orange tank with probe core, docking port, and a few solar panels(mostly just so I could switch control to it to verify the tank was still full).

Wow, very nice. Gonna be hard to beat that one for part count.

Not sure if I absolutely needed it or not, but thought it would help with stability during ascent(especially since I didn't have any fins) and that would be a rather big ship to turn just with the command pod(especially before dropping the first stage. Anyway, that was a ship I just threw together quickly and didn't completely optimize. But yeah, if I could have gotten away without the reaction wheels, then I could have put in a parachute or something instead and still kept to 10 parts. Also could have dropped the mono-propellant to save a bit more weight. Fuel wasn't even really an issue except for the Duna landing and even that was only because I didn't bother waiting for optimal transfer window and there were a lot of things I could have done more efficiently. In any case though, I'd say that was WAY beyond the scope of the original challenge

And with the same 10 part craft as I used before...

Made it back to 71 x 73 km Kerbin orbit with fuel to spare too. Would need 2-3 more parts to be able to actually land it though.