Cpt Kerbalkrunch

Are you guys using those fancy curved monitors? It all looks flat to me.

In that case, maybe you have some trim activated without knowing it? I think it's Alt-X to disable it.

@Fearless Son; been insanely busy this week, so I haven't been able to post, but I saw your question earlier and haven't been able to get back to it 'til now. I've done the "pick-up module from surface" contract a couple of times; both on Minmus. This is the rocket I used. The little rover below becomes the lander and makes the pickup. It has both horizontal and vertical probecores. The vertical was for launch, obviously, but I made it part of the rover for balance. The horizontal then becomes the control point for landing, take off, and return to Kerbin; at which point the engines and tanks are dumped. You can see the heatshield on the opposite end of the Klaw. Didn't really need the shield but, again, I needed to balance out the mass a bit on the return. It just functions like a normal rover on the ground, with the rovemate and the Klaw as the control point. It actually worked really well. You have to jostle the module a bit to get a good surface connection, but it wasn't too difficult. To keep it from dragging the ground I just drove toward and slammed on the brakes to make the weight dive forward. This way you grab it low, and then it lifts up when the rover rocks back to normal. Then you just take off. If your part is heavier, you'll need a larger rover (not to mention the higher gravity on Mun), but the concept is the same. I tried using the sky crane method, which I often use for dropping modules, but it wasn't working for me. I can land close enough to a module to knock the solar panels off, but vertical docking always ends in failure. I haven't tried it in a while, so I might be able to pull it off now, but this worked just fine. And it was kinda fun.

This is the sound of me whistling. And wishing I had a brother who worked at Best Buy.

I'm way late to this party (winter is our busy season, but Christmas week is freakin' brutal; no time to stalk the forum, or even play). Sadly, cuz I love asteroid grabbin'. Just wanted to say quick that your new rig is takin' some sweet screenshots. Looks like money well-spent.

Hmm. The most eye-opening detail here is the revelation that @Geonovast is a spaceplane guy. We'll have to put him on the list. Best to keep track of those guys.

When you want to use multiple points of control on a vessel (ie: one section is built upside-down or sideways), you just need to specify where you want to control it from at a given time. You then right-click the standard, "upside-up" command pod or probecore and hit "control from here" while flying (much like what @Zhetaan suggested above for your rover; which is an absolute necessity). This will ensure your rocket behaves normally while flying. You then switch the control point when you release your rover or lander. And be careful when you change focus off your ship. When you switch back to it, specify which control-point you want to use again. It can sometimes switch back to a different one while off-focus; which you probably won't realize until you start burning and see that your going the wrong way again. It can get a bit frustrating at first, but you'll get used to these things and they won't harm your mission anymore. And one last thing about your rover: all excellent advice above. I would just say (in case you don't already) to always make sure you have a rovemate probecore (right-side up, preferably) horizontally placed somewhere on your rover. Then place the docking port or Klaw on the front or back (or both) as Zhetaan said. I find that, as long as I do this, I don't have to worry about disabling any reaction wheels. Males controlling it a bit less tedious. You'll get the hang of it.

Ah, the greatest Civ of all time. I think I'll still be playing the "Rise of Rome" and "Genghis Khan" scenarios 20 years from now. As for your bases, do you have any screenshots of the troublesome ones? I see these threads all the time, and the bug is well known by now, but I don't really experience these kinds of problems. I currently have bases on Mun, Minmus, Duna, Ike, Gilly (for God's sake), Pol, Bop, and Eeloo. With a large rover/mining base on Moho, and a little one on Tylo. I can use any of them without a problem. Since 1.3.1 I do see a tiny hop when I switch to them. I would equate it to the hop you see on large rockets sometimes when you revert back to the launchpad. Normally, when I see these threads, I assume it's one of the members of the Axis of Evil: autostrut, part clipping, or mods. I think changing the spring strength on legs can do this as well (as I saw someone in another post have this problem because of it). I wonder if I don't see it because I always have my drills in the ground? I'm not sure, really. It has me curious about the cause. Why some and not others?

Thank you, kind sir. (Sorry for the delayed response; work got nuts). The mission was alotta fun. The launch, as you already surmised, was not. I've got a laptop that was pretty much top-of-the-line when I got it 2 years ago (i7, 24gb RAM, 980m, 1.25tb SSD), and is still a monster even now, but launching a 1,400 part behemoth (even with just KAC installed) was a freakin, chore. I can't remember how long it took, but I timed a 1,900 part ship (from hitting the spacebar until stable orbit) at almost exactly 30 minutes. This one was probably about the same. And the really fun part is the staging. You know from playing that it can get a bit confused on large ships. I think I launched 3 or 4 times cuz I kept staging engines. It was a blast.

And @Victor3, if you wanna see a sort of extreme example of Apollo-style, this is my Jool 5 below. Wanted to make all the landings with the Mk1-2 (which is absurdly heavy), so Apollo-style was the only way to go. Obviously, a Mun lander would look nothing like this, but here ya go. https://imgur.com/a/Yog1d

Just built your ship like normal with a docking port on the nose. Then grab another docking port of the same size. Hit the S or W key twice to flip it upside down. Now bring it to the top of your rocket. It should connect to the other docking port easily. Apollo style is a lot of fun, and has a "cool factor" but, for the record, I'm in agreement with @Rocket In My Pocket. I prefer single launches and direct ascents for simplicity's sake. I only go Apollo-style when I need to make multiple landings without refueling or docking. It is a lot of fun, though. And the first time you split one ship into 2 really opens your eyes to how cool this game really is.

Those antennas sticking out are unlikely to survive. In fact, anything not behind your heatshield is in peril on Eve descent. If you are allowed quicksaves, just set a high Pe (like 80-70km), and let Eve bring you down slowly. If you can't quicksave, though, this'll be troublesome, because you won't know where you're coming down. Eve has huge continents, but it's got a pretty big ocean, too. The slow descent will use up more ablator, though, so you'll need to balance the pros and cons. As said above, to land on Eve is easy, leaving it is much more difficult. For a small probe, I generally prefer a heatshield one diameter larger than my fuselage. This usually ensures an easy atmospheric entry.

Not only can it be done, it's pretty much a staple of the game. You can have 100 command modules if you want. Docking ports are the best way to go about connecting them during construction, so that you can reconnect them later. There are other ways, as well. When you detach, as long as it has a command module and pilot (or a probecore), with power, engine and fuel, it will be a completely operable and separate vessel. And they can be reconnected later. It's actually a lot of fun. At work now, so I can't put up any screenshots, but someone surely will. Or just look around the forum. As I said, this is a staple of KSP.

Any chance the brunette will be involved in this challenge? If so, count me in. She's got that late-60's-British-hot-chick thing goin'. I'm diggin' it.

No two burns are exactly alike. By changing the inclination of your last burn, you ended up in a slightly higher orbit. You just needed to burn retrograde a bit more to get your Pe back around 35km again. When you make an escape burn, look at your projected orbit. You want your orbital path to be a straight line following Mun's orbital path to the retrograde side (or prograde if you wanted to raise your orbit). The same applies to interplanetary transfers as well. The closer you are to a straight line on your escape, the more efficient your burn is.

Guess I shouldn't be surprised a guy with a rocket in his pocket beat me to it.

If you play on Steam it'll update automatically when you log in (once it's released and you have auto updates enabled). Otherwise, just keep an eye on the forum so you know when it's ready. I think you'll get the update from the KSP store (free, obviously). The expansion is supposed to be out early in the year (I'm hoping that means by the end of March), and the 1.4 update is required for it to work. So they'll either be released simultaneously, or 1.4 will be out just before the expansion. I think that's probably more likely, as they like to do a pre-release (which you can enable, if you like) to try to iron out the inevitable new bugs that are introduced. Seems to be a never-ending cycle but, as long as it keeps making the game better, I'm all for it.

Minmus is actually a great place to start. Very easy to maneuver around. Try right-clicking your engine and setting the thrust limiter really low if just pressing the shift key once is still too fast. And 5km is a lot. You'll need to get it much closer. And as @Geonovast said, the direction is often a problem. Hover over the node of the desired orbit and make sure it's zero. Then you just need to tweak your orbit to match the target.

(snip) Softened my earlier comment as I just realized you've been playing the demo. Apologies. As for command pods, since 1.2 was released, having a ship with a pilot aboard is often your best bet. Especially when traveling to new worlds where you don't yet have proper communications. Except to transmit science, a command module does not need a connection to Kerbin.

If you've got four and a half minutes (and some headphones, preferably), check this out. It was a lot of fun.

To say that something is "expensive" is about as arbitrary as a description could possibly be. Until you reach a certain threshold, "expensive" is defined by each individual for themselves. For a kid in school with no job, 40 bucks is a lot of money. For most parents, 40 bucks is what you spend when you order pizza. Overpriced, however, is another matter entirely. With video games, it's all about enjoyment and bang for your buck. If you play this game, and you like it, and you don't think it's worth 40 bucks, I think your judgement is in question.

I found this one confusing as well. Sounds like 2 different issues. Not sure about not being able to transfer crew, but quite often I get the issue where I can't change my target. This happens when my focus is on a planet or moon. Just hit Backspace to change focus back to your ship. You should then be able to change targets. Perhaps if you can clarify the crew problem, someone will be able to help you with it. In fact I'm sure of it. Somebody always knows. You just have to explain it properly. And screenshots always help.

Gotta agree with the guys above. I thought the tech-tree was pretty well thought-out. Heavy rocket parts are on the top. So if you like manned rockets (like me), this will be your go-to zone. Unmanned, science-type stuff is on the bottom. So if you like sending probes, you'll concentrate here. These will be small anyway, so you won't need the big rockets. Branching off of these are the pods, landing gear, wheels, docking ports, and all the other things you'll eventually want and need. These are supposed to be tough decisions. When you're ready to open a node and you've got 90 points to spend, that's a bit like having your last 10 bucks in your hand. You're not gonna spend it on just anything. You really need to think about it. I think the game does this well. There is stuff you want, and stuff you need, and some things that just look cool. You have to decide for yourself what's important. Left unsaid, is the middle section of the tree. Therein lies the exotic land of the spaceplane parts. I usually save these for last since I'm a rocket guy. When I saw your question about the Dart yesterday it made me smile because, although I've got about 2,500 hours in, most of that was on a single career. I unlocked the tech-tree so long ago I forgot where things were. I just started a new career a few weeks ago and, after unlocking most of the rocket parts, I suddenly realized I didn't have the Dart. It took some searching to find it hidden with the spaceplane parts; high up in the tree. This was perplexing at first but, when I thought about it for a moment, it made sense. As a rocket guy, I think of it as a "rocket part" because it's my preferred engine for Duna and Laythe landers. However, if you're a spaceplane guy, with its low profile and decent thrust, it probably makes a good VTOL engine. The lack of gimbal would seem to make it tough to control, but I assume they use Vernors or something for stability. Who knows, though? Those spaceplane guys are a strange breed. Anyway, they had to balance need and desire, and everyone's personal preferences; which is pretty tough. I think they did pretty well.

Nicely, done. I think @Corona688's method is gonna catch on around here. It looks pretty cool.

For me, it was when 2 ships separated. You know the way stages can get mixed up. A couple of times I just hit the spacebar without really paying attention. Then, of course, when I build a 1,200 part monster, I sometimes find out the staging wasn't quite right when I suddenly dump a couple of engines I was gonna need sooner or later. Always puts me in a good mood. Come to think of it, I guess that's not hitting the spacebar accidentally. Just hitting the spacebar stupidly.