mk1980

hmm the highest i can think of would be 96% and that would require a bit of sillyness already. similar to the powered landing mission idea i had , but this time also squeezing a rover in there (large servicebay or something) and somehow design it so the rover can also re-dock and be taken back along with all the other stuff. well and i guess if you could *somehow* make that thing solid rocket powered without dropping the solid rockets and also bring the empty SRBs back, that could push it to 102%. no idea if it's possible to squeeze all that insanity into one mission, but since the bonus would be 102%, that mission would be completely unrestricted by mass and would always default to 0 score (or actually negative score that would be improved the bigger the mass gets, lol ) don't know if that's feasible at all, but in theory it is. easiest way to avoid this specific case would be to make the rover automatically rule out elon style, so i don't feel compelled to make a stupid monster mission that lands a rover and brings it back home with an SRB powered ascent vehicle

yeah ok. in that case, i guess an Apollo-like mission profile would be the most reasonable. you have to push both pieces (lander & orbiter) to the mun anyway, so i don't really see much point in splitting them up before they are on a trajectory to the mun. at that point, you could split them up and set the lander can on an impact trajectory and the pod on a flyby (and then capture burn into mun orbit). or you keep them combined until after the capture burn and then descend from mun orbit. i guess the latter would be easier to do. if you split them up while they are in transfer, you might end up in a situation where you'd have to control the capture burn of the pod and the suicide burn of the lander can at the same time.

i don't want to re-do an optimzed version of my original mission just with smaller stuff. that would be kinda boring. currently thinking of a new and (somewhat) different mission profile that involves a separate ascent vehicle and a small rover. i can see a fairly high potential for bonus stacking in such a mission (thanks to the new rover bonus). a transfer ship with extra cabins that ends the tour in kerbin orbit is already worth 33%. bringing 2 separate landers (one that brings the crew and a small rover down, another one that lands unmanned and is used as the ascent vehicle) adds another 33%. i guess the ascent lander could also be shot to duna as a separate launch indpendent of the main ship? we don't have to worry about full reusability of those landers since we don't aim for elon style this time, so they can be more efficient than an SSTO design that must make it back to the mothership in one piece. slow climb & old school are easy enough to get and if we roughly standardize the size of the individual modules, we can also get the "consistency" bonus for using the same launcher. with those stacked bonuses, we're already at 79% which gives us some "wiggle room" for design since individual launches of ~4 tons or less would result in a score roughly on par with current top score. if we go one step further and also use propulsive landings rather than chutes, that's another 10% bonus, ie. a total bonus of 89%. so the modules could be really big - a little less then 8 tons per module with 89% bonus end at roughly the same score as the current leader. so i guess that's what i'm going to aim for

If they can manage it, more power to them! tbh, i'd remove the bonus for adding a launch escape system and probably also the bonus for adding a ladder to the lander. slapping a ladder on a lander can is trivial and really not worth a bonus. the launch escape system seems like an invitation to come up with some silly design to squeeze out some free points from the part of the mission that is trivial anyway (launching stuff to orbit with an unspecified, unrestricted launch system).

did some fooling around with a lander i alt+f12 cheated to duna orbit. it lander didn't quite make it back to orbit (but fairly close). but the idea might have potential. might be doable. https://imgur.com/a/gHN7C don't know if it would also be able to survive LKO reentry and have enough TWR for a suicide burn there, though. tested a modified version using small plane landing gear instead (high crash tolerance + suspension). wouldn't want to sit in that capsule when ithits the ground at 45 m/s, but it surived the impact without blowing up parts https://imgur.com/a/JrsEd it's about 3.5 tons, so if i could improve it a bit and design the other parts to be roughly the same mass, the 80% bonus i'll be shooting for would yield a score slighly lower than current top score lot's of "if" and "would", but i might go for it. not tonight, though.

ok. but adding more and more bonuses might cause problems. simply avoiding a 100% stacking may not be enough. if someone can stack lik 95%, that would still allow for some pretty huge modules that only achieve a good score due to the nature of % stacking.

one question @sevenperforce regarding the bonus On Tongues of Fire. Use no chutes; propulsive landings on both Duna and Kerbin. 10% decrease in highest payload mass. can we use airbrakes for this? currently thinking of a (possible) way to beat the current top score not by going even smaller (don't think that's possible) but rather by stacking more bonuses. if i can cook up a mission plan similar to my original mission, but dropping the glider in favor of some vehicle that uses airbrakes and some thrust to soften the landing, i could raise the score multiplier from the 70% i had in my first run to 81% (assuming i can pull that off). so a mission that uses max module size of ~4 tons would get a score of about 0.8 and anything less than 4 ton per module could beat the current top score. i guess if i game the system and use some silly monster rocket that does crewed starts all the time and has a LES on top (for the"safety first" bonus), that modifier could be stacked to a ridiculous 86%, so even a module size of ~5.8 tons would end up with a score of ~0.8.

using a single command pod or lander can and no rendezvous is by far the easiest solution. adding a rendezvous in mun orbit or a second launch and both a rendezvous in kerbin and mun orbit makes the mission needlessly complicated.

haha, it didn't even occur to me that a mission to duna with only a handful of those tiny oscar fuel tanks and 2 sparks could be viable that's really impressive! also, i liked the use of those I-Beams to line up the docking ports - that's a clever idea

looks like the whole "ring" section in that video was actually launched in one piece. the only space assembly that takes place is docking the large premade sections to each other. and docking some minor stuff to various ports along the huge premade sections

Fantastic! Great job, I'll update the leaderboard. I'm really horrible at winged rolling landings myself. the landing on kerbin wasn't really that hard. that plane doesn't fly particularly nicely due to the high drag, but it had pretty large wings, so it could still keep a more or less prograde flight at ~35 m/s shortly before touching down. the duna landing was by far the worst part of the mission. i had to reload the final seconds of the landing about a dozen times. the air on duna is very thin, especially since my landing spot was at ~4500m altitude. i don't think i'll ever do a winged duna lander again...

reloaded the last save and replayed the aerobrake & landing. looks ok to me. almost made it to KSC runway, but the glider flies like a cow (i think the ladder and the lander can produce a lot of drag). but this time i erred on the correct side and landed it on solid ground. https://imgur.com/a/TJQs3 @sevenperforce let me know if that's good enough for the Winged It bonus. this time i made a proper named save before landing. could redo it once more to finally nail a KSC landing.

try turning off SAS / shutting down all reaction wheels and wait a while. the wobble may be the effect of several reaction wheels "figthing" each other. when (if) the wobbling ends at some point, right click the outermost parts of your station and activate the autostruts - that should keep (more or less) fix the parts in their current position. you may have to enable the option "advanced tweakables" in the settings for the "autostrut" option - i think it's off by default.

can you post a screenshot of your design? it's much easier to understand what you're doing and give suggestions when we can see your design. also, you can start a "sandbox" game and take a look at the "stock" aircraft that come with the game. maybe you can learn a few things just by looking at their designs and flying them.

don't worry - that's fair. will take a look at the named saves i made during the mission. i think i didn't make one for the landing (which was my own fault) but i think i made one shortly before the kerbin aerobrake, so i might replay that last part and redo the landing.

After playing for about 7 hours straight, i finally completed my journey. made about 60 screenshots of the trip. important info first - the craft in the VAB Editor. https://imgur.com/a/C3B0T after some back and forth and a few ideas i scrapped, i went with only 2 parts - a mothership with (empty) tanks, heatshield and crew cabin, and the glider (that doubles as the engine of the mothership when docked). the other 3 launches were fuel deliveries for the 3 tanks of the mothership. mothership launch https://imgur.com/a/b8g8P fuel deliveries. 3 separate launches. i resisted the tempation to skip that (rather boring) part and launch the main ship with full tanks. https://imgur.com/a/inp1A finally launching the glider. i forgot to timewarp to the launch window before i launched the otehr 4 parts, so i figured i should at least wait before launching the crewed vehicle. also had to redesign the damn glider last minute because i realized that the original design had only 2 seats (2 lander cans). switched one lander can for a 2 seat passenger mk1 pod. had to drop some fuel from the tank to keep the mass below the target value. https://imgur.com/a/47d1u after finishing the assembly, it was time to start the journey. i messed up the original aerocapture maneuver (19km above duna is TOO LOW). settled for ~25 km https://imgur.com/a/MJERR landing the glider and launching it back to rendezvous with the mothership https://imgur.com/a/sOdmg return to kerbin https://imgur.com/a/5QJU3 circularizing & lading the shuttle on kerbin https://imgur.com/a/wWqEC the motherships has a dry mass / mass when it first arrives in parking orbit of 4.850 tons, the Glider masses 4.810 tons. the fuel launches added 4 tons of fuel to the mothership, each. i think the mission fulfills the criteria for the following achievements: Wing It. Winged, rolling landings on Duna and Kerbin. 5% decrease in highest payload mass. Old School. No nukes or ions. 3% decrease in highest payload mass. Slow Climb. Put ladders on your vehicles so you don't have to jetpack around on the Duna surface. 4% decrease in highest payload mass. Elon Style. Make the whole system fully reusable without using nukes, ions, or airbreathers. 25% decrease in highest payload mass. Stayin' Alive. Bring extra living space (at least one extra seat per Kerbal) for the transfer to and from Duna. 18% decrease in highest payload mass. Loop The Loop. Make your transfer vehicle a fully-reusable solution that can brake back into Kerbin orbit and be used again for the next trip. 15% decrease in highest payload mass. so the total modifier should be 5+3+4+25+18+15 = 70% heaviest payload was 4850kg final score = 1.455 (?) fun challenge!

ok good. i have a few ideas to trim some fat off that glider. if i get that thing down to ~5 tons, i could probably also downsize the fuel tanks to a similar size since the ship will also need less fuel for the roundtrip.

argh. will have to downscale my mission a bit. no way to beat Laie's score with a 10 ton vehicle. but i might be able to downsize some stuff. with all the % bonuses i'm trying to get, i might at least get close... one question @sevenperforce : can a mission get both "Loop the Loop" and "Elon Style" ? with those two combines and a few more "low hanging fruit", the modifier could be pushed up to maybe 70% or so, which would drop a mission with a 5 ton heaviest module down to a score of 1.5

a bit late for a rule suggestion, but did you consider a rule/achievement that gives a %bonus if all launches use the same launch vehicle (same rocket up to the fairing that holds the payload. or same space shuttle / SSTO except for the stuff inside the cargo bay/cargo fairing). in the real world, design of the launch vehicle is a big deal and it would seem likely that a space agency would try to use the same vehicle for launches of payloads with similar sizes. judging from the teaser image posted by Laie, it looks like he's doing that already and i think that's a pretty cool little detail that should be rewarded. i probably won't be able to use the same vehicle for all launches, though. strapping a plane on top of a rocket is usually a recipe for disaster...

i formed a rough mission plan and have some questions regarding the "achievements" i might build a small-ish winged glider to land on duna and later on kerbin (for "Wing It") and use some sort of mothership that will stay in duna orbit and will circularize in kerbin orbit after return - which i guess would also fulfill "Loop The Loop". assuming i can pack enough fuel for the transfer to duna and back (which may or may not be possible - depending on how much dV i can realistically save by carefully aerobreaking), both the mothership and the glider would arrive in kerbin orbit after the mission the glider would then return to kerbin surface with the whole crew while the mothership stays in the parking orbit. so in theory, the system would be fully reusable since the mothership could be refuelled and the glider could land on the KSC runway and launched again later (similar to a space shuttle). would that also count for "Elon Style", then? what if the glider only has 2 seats an can only return 2 of the 3 kerbals down to kerbin surface? does it still count if the third guy stays in orbit (or picked up by some other ship later). also, i guess it would make more sense to not land the glider at all if the mission is supposed to be re-usable (launching some extra fuel is cheaper than launching the whole glider again)? i guess "Stayin' Alive." could be squeezed in. it would increase the scale of the mission and would probably make the individual launches heavier - so amere 9% discount seems counter productive (i have a feeling the ship will need much more then just 9% more mass to haul an extra hitchiker container or similar all the way to duna?) also, it's unclear whether Cherry Bomb would apply for a mission that doesn't use extra stages/droptanks at all (ie. something like the proposed mothership & lander glider) splitting the launches to minimze the payload per launch will be difficult. how does the "heaviest module" rule handle fuel launches? assuming i launch my glider with empty tanks and split the mothership into two parts for the sake of argument, let's say the glider is 8 tons dry weight, the hab/engine module of the mothership is ~5 tons and the partially empty tank section (separate launch) of the mothership is also 8 tons. the glider might need 4 tons of fuel and the mothership might need another 10 tons of fuel, so i could send up 2 refuelling missions. one with 8 tons tons and one with 6 tons and a capsule that brings the 3 kerbals to the ship (including a LEV at liftoff ) the glider is now technically ~12 tons and the main ship tank is ~20 tons, but they were not actually launched with that weight. would that be a "legal" way of bypassing your rules or would the main tank still count as the heaviest part with 20 tons or do the (multiple) 8 ton launches count as the highest launch payload? guess i'll fire up the game and start working on it. see if i my mission profile is viable at all. i think it would work fine with nukes, but may be too ambitious for chemical engines. EDIT: did some testing before i fully commit. made a small-ish mk2 glider with enough wing surface to land on duna unpowered and enough fuel to return to orbit and (probably) rendezevous https://imgur.com/a/6qj9j so that part of the plan should work. that thing can carry 4 kerbals down and masses a bit less than 10 tons fuelled (~6 tons empty). landing on kerbin should be easy if it even manages to land on duna EDIT 2: some more planning command and hab module will be a hitchhiker, probecore, solar panels, big reaction wheel and a 3.75meter heatshield. the heatshield will probably be launched "empty" - should have enough heat resistance even without ablator. the module is ~5 tons, so even with a full shield it would be smaller than the other modules. i don't think it's possible to refill an empty heatshield in orbit, though (concerning the "full reusability") then 3 tank sections. basically 3 almost identical launches. 9t tanks +2 docking ports (0.1 ton if i use the mod sized ones, 0.4 if i stick with the larger oes that look better) and the glider i already testet - which will will be the last launch and bring up the kerbals. it's engine is powerful enough to push the whole train to duna, so no real need to slap on more engines on other parts of the vessel. https://imgur.com/a/XMuRK you know, that might actually work. deltaV is a bit low-ish, but if i can make good use of the heatshield and cut most of the cost of the orbital insertions via aerobraking, it should be more than enough for a roundtrip. won't execute the mission today. maybe tomorrow if i have time to play.

thanks. wasn't such a smart idea to skip the landing gear on the shuttle to save 3 parts with landing gear, i probably could have landed it on the KSC grounds or even the runway. anyway, fun challenge

here's my entry for Type 2: Joint Munar Obit Rendezvous will correct the links if i figure out how to embed them as proper albums the vessels i used: https://imgur.com/a/JJO7A launch and transfer of the Lander & Rover to Mun parking Orbit https://imgur.com/a/SDTK5 launch & transfer of the Shuttle https://imgur.com/a/aVfo6 Rendezvous in Mun Orbit https://imgur.com/a/qyckh Mun Landing https://imgur.com/a/YoYZ8 return to orbit & rendezvous no. 2 https://imgur.com/a/4zveu return to Kerbin & landing https://imgur.com/a/ZOo5K rocket 1 (unmanned) 27 parts, rocket 2 (shuttle) 20 parts base score: 200 - 47 parts = 153 +10 for 2 stage lander *2 for rover *2 for shuttle *2 for no fuel transfer (not needed, had plenty of deltaV ) possibly *3 for low tech - up to you (highest tech used were probably the rover wheels, the retractable solar panels and maybe the docking ports and the small delta wings of the shuttle. none of the parts was higher up the tech tree then the 160 nodes. ) don't know how the multiplication rules should be applied (additive/multiplicative)

to debug the problem, you could set the cargo bay that holds the rover as the root part in the editor, remove the other parts of the ship and "launch" only the cargo bay & rover. if that fails, it's probably some issue with clipping or whatever and it won't work in a real mission, either.

but what would be the purpose? there's really not a whole lot of stuff to do once you arrive somewhere. to me, the game is about how to get there. once i've landed on some moon or planet, i run the science experiments once, maybe drive around in a rover for a few minutes (if i brought one) and then i jump back into the rocket and start the journey back home. that's what the game is about, isn't it?

a correction burn is probably best done somewhere in the middle of the transfer. in my case, the descending node happened to be roughly halfway to duna, so i put the maneuver node there. time to node was something like 90 days or so (i set it up right after ending the burn in LKO) after placing the maneuver node, i focus on duna and look around where the current (pre-correction) trajectory is. then mouse over the vector-manipulation thingies (don't know how they are actually called ) and use the mousewheel to increase / decrease the burn components. dragging the vector thingies is too inaccurate. if the current trajectiory is above/below the planet, the pink axis (normal/antinormal) can shift your projected course up/down. if it's too far "inside" or "outside" the orbit line, you can add prograde or retrograde to shift it inwards or outwards. if duna's moon (ike) gets in the way, you can add a bit of radial or anti radial to the burn (which also tends to shift the trajectory in/out) and correct it back with more pro/-retrograde. that last bit probably sounds weird, but what it does is - adding (or removing) velocity in anti/-radial direction will make you arrive a few hours earlier or later, and by correcting the distance from the planet via pro/retrograde velocity, your ship will still arrive at roughly the same spot (relative to duna), but at a different time (a few hours more or less should be enough to avoid ike if it gets in the way) long story short - put a maneuver node somewhere in the middle of the transfer focus on duna, rotate the camera so you can see duna, your projected course and the node, and use fine input via mousewheel to gently add/remove speed from the 3 axes until the flyby looks good. a trial-and error approach works fine, you'll figure out which vector does what fairly quickly. if you mess it up completely, just delete the node and start from scratch. you have all the time in the world. it will take 100 days or whatever until your ship actually reaches the node. as for executing the burn: using RCS is fine. if you don't have RCS, you can also use the main engine(s) of the ship. it will be a delicate high precision burn, so it's probably a good idea to right click the engines and set their thrust limiter very low (so you have better fine control over the exact amount and avoid overshoot). if you used the thrust limiter, don't forget to toggle it back to full thrust after the correction (otherwise you might forget and then zoom past duna wondering why you barely slow down. that happened to me a friend of mine and i he felt like an idiot. ahem