sevenperforce

The Wikipedia article on Direct Ascent is just flatly wrong. There were actually five competing designs for getting to the Moon and back: Direct Ascent (Nova). Stack an Earth-entry command module on top of a transfer stage on top of a moon-ascent stage on top of a moon landing stage on top of a moon capture stage on top of a TLI transfer stage on top of a ginormous lift vehicle. This approach is the easiest thing to do in KSP, since the dV requirements aren't really very high and you can combine stages. Earth Orbit Rendezvous (Saturn C1). Use separate launches to orbit an Earth entry command module, a transfer stage, a moon-ascent stage, a moon landing stage, a moon capture stage, and a TLI transfer stage, then dock them together in LEO and proceed from there. This approach is overkill for the Mun in KSP but can work well for Duna missions. Lunar Orbit Rendezvous (Saturn V, N1). Launch a command module and a separate landing module, together, directly to the moon using a very large lift vehicle; use the landing module to descend to the moon and then return, and then come back to Earth in the command module. This approach matches the Apollo missions and is a LOT of fun to fly but isn't much more efficient than Direct Ascent (at least, not in KSP). It's great for Eve missions, though. Joint Lunar Orbit Rendezvous (Gemini to the Moon). Launch an unmanned landing module directly to the moon, then launch a manned command module directly to the moon. Dock them in lunar orbit, climb out of the command module and into the landing module, then proceed as in the Lunar Orbit Rendezvous approach. This is good if you have a large launch vehicle but not one quite large enough to throw a full-size LOR mission at the moon. Not recommended for anything outside Kerbin's SOI, due to the need for multiple transfer windows. Double Orbit Rendezvous. Do a Lunar Orbit Rendezvous mission, but assemble it using multiple launches in Low Earth Orbit. This is the most time-consuming and requires a LOT of docking, but it can be good practice and is excellent for when you have a very small launch vehicle. "Direct Ascent" never means launching pure-radial. This is a really ridiculously bad idea; you're fighting gravity drag virtually all the way and no one would ever do it in real life. Always, always do a gravity turn. There is a form of "direct ascent" where you time your launch such that you continue on to a trans-munar injection while you are completing your gravity turn, so your periapsis never actually comes above the atmosphere. This is just slightly more efficient than circularizing before your TMI, but the difference is really, really minimal. And this wasn't the difference between the competing moon mission architectures; the "direct ascent" architecture meant the astronauts went straight from the lunar surface back to Earth, rather than docking with a command module in lunar orbit.

I set the reaction wheel as the root part and then rotated the existing probe core 90 degrees; nothing happened whatsoever. I've also tried putting Kerbals in the command seats and controlling from there; also nothing. Well, I shouldn't say nothing. If I set it to regular staging mode and press W, it starts doing front-flips and rips itself apart.

I do not believe the Flea would be enough to make orbit, not once you add Kerbals to the command seats. In order to earn the bonus, it actually needs to reach stable Duna orbit, though I would recommend throwing some RCS on there so you can dock it to a waiting orbiter, and then using the orbiter to head home. This approach does require a Kerbin lander which is separate from the Duna lander and Duna ascent vehicle, but there are ways of pulling that off. You are correct that command seats do not count for the 2 seats per kerbal bonus.

Building a super-lightweight rover for my No Moar Boosters challenge, and I can't for the life of me get it to work. No matter where I control it from, no matter whether I use docking or staging view, no matter what key combination I press, I can't get it to go forward or backward using wheel torque. Won't move. Great at braking, though. What am I doing wrong?

I've got a Duna Ascent Vehicle that's solid-fueled and lands with a liquid-fueled skycrane...it'll mass just over 6 tonnes. I've got a Tongues Of Fire one-way lander that's even lighter. Just trying to get the rover to work properly, now. Remember that it's ok to put command seats on your ascent vehicle as long as it still docks with the orbiter -- no Watneying up.

What if we build a plane with actual seats?

Having the monoprop tanks in the center helped with alignment! Once I got it lined up, it slid right in. Pretty much all the stages were WAY overpowered, which is why I was so ridiculously overmass compared to everybody else. And yeah, it was a Kerbin-retrograde reentry, which explains why my tank blew on the aerocapture.

So I thought I should probably actually post my first mission before I finish my second one! Here's what the transfer vehicle was planned to look like in orbit (yes, I forgot you can set radial decouplers to allow crossfeed): It's tidily split into four dockable segments: All used the same exact ascent vehicle (with slightly different fairings, and an LES on the final, crewed launch). All four launches (I could have launched each component empty and sent up a refueling mission, but then I couldn't claim Brute Force). Ascent and docking highlights: And here we are in orbit, ready to head to Duna! Warped for a while, and set up the transfer window... We're off! Heading to Duna: Here goes nothing: Bill getting out to repack the chutes. I skipped the ladders, obviously. On Duna: Liftoff! Ascent and homeward journey: Almost home! Made it back safe. So, let's see here. Heaviest launch was 11.745 tonnes (the totally overpowered crew module), I earned the Brute Force bonus, making my score 10.3356. Yuck!

Wanna reiterate the need for cabin count rebalancing.

Those rules were added after I submitted my entry! From someone who has learned this the hard way: if you want people to enter your challenge, you should provide a competitive aspect to it. Like, "Build a side-slung-vertically-launched, horizontally-landed shuttle capable of delivering 15 tonnes of payload to the surface of Minmus and returning to KSC; lowest liftoff mass wins." That gives people something to optimize against and allows us to test our designs against each other.

Read it -- won't bother. It's just tedious unless there is some kind of competition associated with it.

Example (this was quick-and-dirty):

Not to rain on your parade, but you may want to be a touch more specific. It would take very little to satisfy this challenge and you have no judging metric.

The point of having an crew ascent vehicle separate from the crew lander is that your means of leaving Duna is assured before you land. So, if you come down hard, crack a landing leg, and crush an engine on touchdown, it's not a death sentence. However, with this approach, it doesn't really make sense to have your crew lander also be an ascent vehicle, because you have a separate one. If you use a separate ascent vehicle, you leave the landing vehicle behind.

Note that I updated the OP to specify that Rollin' conflicts with Elon Style. So there's no use trying to reuse the rover. Justin Case also specifically conflicts with Elon Style. Using a rover and a separate ascent vehicle gives a combined bonus of 33%, which beats Elon Style's 25%. You can bump it up a bit more if the Ascent Vehicle is solid-fueled. I'm working on a solid MAV now.

Brute Force requires that the ascent stage be stacked on top of the descent stage, which stacked on top of the transfer stage. The rules also indicate that if you use a separate ascent vehicle, you need to have a rover to take the crew from the descent vehicle to the ascent vehicle. I updated the OP with a list of conflicts.

The highest I had come up with was 95%, using Old School, Consistency, Slow Climb, Tongues of Fire, Stayin' Alive, Loop the Loop, Justin Case, A Solid Plan, and Rollin'. Rollin', Justin Case, and A Solid Plan are all presumed to rule out Elon Style, but I'll make that clearer. Maybe add a list of bonus collisions.

That's about what I'm aiming for as my second entry as well (still cropping and collating the album from my first entry), so I'm interested to see how you pull it off! Note that a solid-fueled ascent vehicle gives an added boost, but obviously is heavier. How exactly? Enough of the bonuses are mutually exclusive that I don't think you could hit 100%.

I'll take the LES bonus off (even though I did it on my own rocket). It does restrict launch types somewhat, though. Not going to remove the ladder one, just because people have already gotten bonuses for it.

Oh, I was answering the question about the SRB escape system. There is a bonus for using a solid-fueled separate ascent vehicle...maybe you weren't asking about that, though?

Winged, rolling landings are only for the manned landings, so you can do a completely separate ascent vehicle. Of course, if you're leaving your glider on Duna and taking a separate ascent vehicle, you'll need a separate gliding lander for Kerbin to get Wing It. And that precludes Elon Style. If they can manage it, more power to them! Impressive kaboom.

Loop The Loop can definitely be compatible with Elon Style, but typically if you have Loop The Loop then you'd also end up with Stayin' Alive. Elon Style necessarily includes Old School. I think I should add a sizeable bonus for including a rover on the lander, to induce larger, more true-to-life landers, but I don't want to unbalance it. Yes, you can absolutely use airbrakes. I'm going to add a couple more bonuses here in a bit.

Lowest score wins.

Wow, that's fantastic. Really ridiculously impressed! Unfortunately, it doesn't qualify for Loop The Loop; that's if you have a transfer vehicle that brakes back into Kerbin orbit and remains in orbit, ready for the next trip. Think the Hermes or an Aldrin cycler. But even without LtL you're still at an impressive 0.8136!

Yeah, it was an ambitious plan. Asparagus-staged aerospike-nozzle boosters lofting a ginormous glider with dual-thrust-axis retrorockets, then remove and reinstall the rockets to assist with takeoff.