IWanttobeEVA

Best way is to use the prograde and retrograde markers when you are switched to 'target' in the navball. Choose retrograde and fire until you hit zero m/s. Then you can choose 'target' and then fire toward the craft you're docking with. As you orbit around Mun or Kerbin the vector between you and the target will misalign, so repeat the procedure again as needed until you close. As you gain more experience with orbiting you will be able to figure out the thrust vector you need to keep moving toward the target. At less than 200m I kill all of the momentum and I switch to RCS and use 'H' and 'N' to close the last distance at a few m/s so I don't have to keep flipping my ship around.

In early part of the game with only a MkI and a MK1 crew cabin the best way to recuse Kerbals is to get <1000m to the stranded Kerbal. EVA the standard Kerbal and spacewalk over to the rescue craft. Grab onto the Mk1 command pod. You won't be able to enter because Jeb, or some other pilot, is there, so type ']' to switch to the rescue craft and let Jeb kick it in the crew cabin. Type ']' again to switch back to the Kerbal who should still be holding onto the Mk1 Pod and press 'B' to have him board. If he or she isn't a pilot you need to shuffle them around again. With the Mk1-2 you can avoid all this shuffling around and have room for two rescues.

Here is my 'Apollo' mission craft. As pointed out it is easier to make a single vessel for a Mun landing and return, but this is fun and if you plan to visit other planets with a mothership/lander operation this is a good first step.

Once I get the Mk1-2 and the Mainsail in career mode it becomes the work horse of my space program. 1) Rescue missions are so much easier without having to have Kerbals go on space walks to get the pilot back in the command seat. I could use a probe core here, but I usually forget about it until Jeb is kicking it in the passenger module somewhere with no other pilots on board. 2) I'm not much of a fan of the Jr. docking port. The Mk1-2 with the regular docking port on the top is my preferred docking vechile for space stations and landers. A Mk1-2 in Mürar orbit with a lander can for multiple missions can run so many different types of contracts that these missions are always super-profitable and they more than pay for the mission.

Maybe not a full repair but an L4 or L5 can maybe jury-rig something out of the broken/smashed parts to give "Solar Panel - repaired" that is 25~30% capability of an undamaged one. No spare parts needed, and you still pay a penalty for killing your solar panel (because it almost always is the result of carelessness).

Alris Kerbin accidentally was on EVA when the mothership broke orbit from Mun. She had to fly like super-girl and cover a 62km gap to meet up with the ship, but she made it with 0.15 left in the jet pack. Not quite as dramatic as the final scene from "The Martian", but a pretty exciting 30min.

Zen like patience is needed. I usually do best with the claw by lining up the target icon, the prograde vector, and the front of the ship exactly together on the navball and approaching at 0.3~0.6m/s. Make sure to remember to click 'control from here' on the claw so it points to the target. If anyone of these is even slightly askew the target will bounce off the claw because I guess it won't hit dead center and any tangential velocity will cause it to spin-off, making it even harder to grab on the next try.

Your best bet might be to break your orbit and plot a return to Kerbin orbit, and as you swing around Kerbin plot an trajectory so you orbit Mun the opposite way. I think this might be cheaper in dV then to try to flip the orbit 180'. Example: to flip your orbit from a 50Km orbit on Mun 180' is about 1000 dV, but swinging around Kerbin and orbiting the other way can be done for about 1/2 that amount.

Here is a small Mun or Minmus lander: Opps, don't casually walk into the landing leg...

I think these have been around since 1.1 at least. I get them for nearby rovers and Kerbals on EVA, measurements for the rovers, and collect surface samples or make EVA reports for the Kerbals.

For Duna and Eve chemical rockets work just fine. I prefer the mothership+lander approach. Build it with a little more dV than you would to go to Mun and it will be pretty close. You can test it by going the Mun and back to see who much extra dV you have. Mission to Duna before leaving Kerbin:

Stuck the landing on Gilly. I mean I had to fire the RCS to make sure it stuck on the surface.

Reverse the motor (Normal to Inverse, I think) on one side of the rover only (two of the wheels). I've noticed that if you land a rover near the poles of a moon or planet on set of wheels will turn in revese. If you put a Kerbel in the command set and click control from here it will operate normally like it did on Kerbin. Quite strange, but I could be doing something wrong building it too.

The above website, and a printed out protractor (no joke). If you have any transparent film that will work the best but thin paper will work too. Here is a good 360 degree on that you can scale. http://www.blocklayer.com/protractor-print.aspx

The command module ran into a mountain; it's gone. RIP your brave crew. I try to stay above 15km orbiting Mun for a little margin of safety. The rescue mission needs a rescue mission now.

In the touchpad settings you can set the right-click function to be one of the corners of the pad or as a special gesture, such as click with thumb while touching with two fingers or clicking with two fingers.

I think the initial encounter is important to dock smoothly. I try for an encounter of less than 3km. The relative speed between the aggressor and the target is determined by the difference in the initial orbits. So if the aggressor vessel's orbit is a lot bigger or smaller than the target orbit you might want to make an intermediate orbit that is closer ( not matching) to the target making it easier to get a close encounter at a reasonable relitive speed. Once you do the burn to the encounter you can use your RCS on the aggessor vessel to get even closer, usually by genally tapping H or N and watching the encounter distance. When you are at 0.0m/s to the target, turn the aggessor to the target marker in the navball. Increase your speed to a few m/s to the target. The prograde icon will appear over the target. As the target and aggressor are not yet in the same orbit the prograde will drift off the target so your velocity vector relitive to the target no longer lines up. When the prograde marker drifts off by 20-25' line up to the prograde marker, turn on the RCS and use N until you're back to 0.0m/s. Turn back to the target and repeat until you can line up and dock. I almost alway use RCS to close so I don't have to keep flipping my ship 180'. Keeping the velocity low will save on RCS fuel and make the needed velocity adjustments shorter but likely more numerous.

Can I name an engineer? Dr. Claudia Alexander, project manager for NASA's Galileo mission to Jupiter. She also studies and is published on the interior physics and evolution of comets, Juptier and its moons,magnetospheres, space plasma, the solar wind, and the planet Venus.

You really only need one solar panel to transmit scientific data from a probe, you just want just slightly more battery power to transmit the data from the most demanding instrument you have on board with the antenna on the probe. Then wait until the batteries recharge to do the next measurement. You can calculate how many batteries you need, or just build your probe and test out the scientific transmission on the launch pad and add or subtract batteries as needed. The trouble with all solar power is the energy flow has to keep up with the data transmission for the entire transmission or it will abort and no data will be sent. Then I think it's better to have the power stored already and the batteries will recharge eventually even if you have very weak energy flow. Also, even if you have a bad landing you still might be able to return some data.

And mashing 'X' really hard and screaming 'Noooooo Nooooo Noooo' should make your lander upright after you flipped it by fat fingering 'Z' instead of shutting the engines down ....

When you're in 'target' mode the nav-ball indicators relate to you're vessel's velocity vector relative to the target. If the prograde indicator lines up with the target indictor it means you're approaching the target head on. You use these in target mode to match your orbit and position to the target vessel.

Try not to land during the night! Lights and driving IVA are the best suggestions, also as you feel you're getting close drop your speed relative to the surface so the yellow indicator light turns off and proceed at around 10-12m/s decent, you'll burn though your fuel but when the lights do illuminate the surface at about 30m to go you'll have a second or two to make a final burn and land softly on the surface assuming you're not on the side of a crater.

If you want actual realism killing or stranding too many crew would result in a investigation from Kongress and after a scathing report outlining the lax saftey culture of the space program from the AIB headed by Harold J. Kerman, former commander in chief of combined Kerbal forces, forced to resign your position as KSP director. Game over. I think I'll just stick with the current system.

No one way or suicide missions, and resuce stranded Kerbalnauts. But other than that no rules. I leave derbies everywhere and anywhere of all types if it buys a couple extra dV and saves a few Funds during the mission. I do try to return with science instruments as these tend to be expensive so some funds can be recovered, but that's not an ethics consideration. And I have no problems sending a Kerbal on a multi-year long mission in a MkI capsule. If you didn't want to be in the program...

32. (corollary to 31.) KSP x.x.x is so y that I'm reverting to KSP z.z.z until there isn't as much y any longer.