stephensmat

Today's Achievement: A Solar Station. It was a Contract, to put a station in Solar Orbit. I loaded it up with every Science Experiment I could, and mounted a probe guidance on top. A moment of honor, please, for the two scientist Kerbals who are now orbiting the Sun in their Lab, likely not to return for a million years. I also managed to mount an Infared Scanner on top, so I got two contracts, and started scanning for asteroids I can grab. How I got the thing into orbit without flipping her a hundred times I'll never know, but I got there. I'm rapidly approaching the point where my science labs will give me all the points I need to max out the whole tech tree. After that, the science I collect goes 100% into profit, thanks to my recent upgrade to the Admin Building. I can finally stop taking tourism contracts for scratch. At this point, the Contracts are giving me signposts on where to go next. My next stop: Gilly. I've been assembling a ship in Orbit for A Duna Mission, but Gilly came up first. Wish me luck!

Today's achievement: I caught my first asteroid. A small one, and I had it drilled dry before I got to my next manoeuvre node, but I successfully got it into Minmus orbit, and fulfilled a contract.

The enormous interstellar distances are many times more than in-system distances. KSP1 has limits on how fast you can warp when close to atmosphere, because you need to be able to slow it down again before you crash. If travelling to another system in KSP2 is a long-LONG flight, then maybe being outside the system will let you speed up to another level. 10,000X when you go from planet to planet, 500,000X when you go from star to star.

Wouldn't be that impossible. They already have 'Cannot warp in an atmosphere' or 'cannot warp while EVA'. Now it's 'Cannot warp 1 Billion X while in System' The real question is how they treat everything going on 'in system' during the flights. And as to how many Systems to explore, it's perfect for DLC. They can spend a year making each planet an artwork, each system unique, maybe unlock some new science branches from visiting each one, bring the tech back to Homeworld with you...

I have a contract to put a station around Minmus. One of the requirements is to have 4000 Units of liquid fuel. Another is that the station has to be 'fully assembled' when launched. Just curious, does refuelling the tanks count as 'assembly', or can I refill her later and claim the win?

This is my only great fear. In science mode, you unlock the tree, and what else is there? In career mode, you get rewarded for incremental, repetitive steps. Somewhere between the two, you get a a re-playable game. KSP1 is grindy, once you get used to all the steps involved. In KSP1, when you unlock a vital new part, it's like the game is made new again. There's a whole new horizon for you to explore because you can get there now. KSP2 has orbital construction and planetary colonization. Things I've really wished KSP1 had. It's really the only missing piece. My fear is that interstellar flight is just the same system over again, after you've unlocked the tech tree, with a longer warp between steps.

Reusability would make sense. Remember that they're talking about 'routine' flights running on auto, so that you always look forward. But it would be an unlockable. SpaceX made it's mark in the years since development on KSP2 started. Reusability in Space beyond the shuttle program is entirely the product of the last five or ten years.

Today, I pulled off my first rescue. I have to be honest: I suck at docking. I've always used Mechjeb for that. Playing my first career mode, I haven't unlocked that Mechjeb level yet. I'm building cash using tourists, and I got a two-fer by taking a contract for a Mun Rock return. Five tourists to the Mun. I decide to go for a three-fer, by taking a Contract for putting a science station in Mun orbit. I do the math and my booster can do it. See, the problem with the 'station' contracts is that you need five Kerbals on board, and I don't have a large enough pool of Kerbalnauts yet. So I decide to try something: What if the contract only needs to be ticked off? What if I take a science lab with my five tourists... and then jettison the science lab? And it worked. Ten seconds in Mun orbit with the Lab, the contract flashes green, and then I cut the weight loose and land. I've got my Mun rock, and my fees... And I realize I either landed long, or got the math wrong. I don't have enough Delta-V to return to Kerbal. I do, however, have just enough to get into a decent orbit. And that's it. My lander is now tumbling around in Mun orbit. The lander has a Docking Clamp Jr on the side, because that was a requirement for the Station Contract. I never planned to use it. I never planned to dock... But I want that Mun rock back, safe and sound, to say nothing of five Kerbals. So I pull together a 'rescue craft', and try my luck at docking. Remember when I said I was having trouble filling station seats? My pilots are busy right now. I had planned to get my best pilot back from the Mun for the next flight, but she's waiting for rescue. So I have to recruit one. No Mechjeb to fall back on, Level 1 pilot on the craft with RCS. I'm on the dark side of the Mun, and my target craft has no RSC, no fuel, can't manouver, and its clamp is in the middle of the Hitchhiker can. Took me nine tries, but I got them to dock at last! I turn the whole thing around and burn for home. When my path leads to splashdown, I disconnect, get my rescue craft into a messy orbit, and switch to bring my tourists home safe, with surface samples and a Mun Rock as prize. I feel like I just got to the end of 'Apollo 13', with Mission Control cheering and weeping.

I unlocked some new fuel tanks, and decided to take them for a spin. I booked four tourists who wanted to 'orbit Mun', 'Flyby Mun, 'Orbit Minmus' and 'Land on Minmus'. I used a MK3 Capsule and a Hitchiker can to get them all on the same flight, and stretched the Delta-V enough to make a Mun orbit, and a Minmus landing, and then home safe. Two different Tourist contracts, plus a request to plant a flag, all on the one mission.

Today I took contracts to put a space station in the orbit of Kerbin, and then another for the Mun. I still had my 'sub assemblies' from my Science Only Game. The contracts said they had to be full assembled for Launch, so I yanked a lot of the parts, but I managed to keep the science labs. I'm hoping the smaller batteries/solar panels I was forced to downgrade to will be enough to keep them running. The good news is, I have science labs with docking ports now. One major advantage of the Career over the Science Mode is the policy of selling surplus science points. In science mode, there wasn't much to it once you unlocked the tree. But I'm really glad I started with Science Mode, because it got me some saved ships to work with when I got to Career mode.

I've launched a Station with a Science Lab into Orbit of Kerbin and The Mun. I've done most of the experiments available to get these parts unlocked, but there's one or two left. My question is, can I direct where the data is transmitted, or do I have to store it, dock with my science stations, and transfer it directly?

Ah. See? Now that, I did not know. Thanks so much.

I've got a Tourist mission to land a VIP on the Mun. But I'm pretty sure I won't have the Delta-V to make it back, and I can't revert to the VAB at this point. I'm on approach to landing. I can either put myself back in orbit, or I can use up my Delta-V on a landing. The Contract says 'Land on the Mun'. It says nothing about making it back. I might even be able to tick this one off and rescue my VIP and Pilot much later. It's my first Career Mode play, and I don't have all the parts I need for a rescue craft unlocked yet. If I set her down, I think I'm going to complete the contract, I just don't know if I should. I'm on Pause right now, so I hope someone who's done this contract before can give me a 'Go/No Go' for landing pretty quick...

One question: If I land there on my own for the science, do I forfeit all contracts to that effect?

What I want to experience with this game, more than anything, is the feeling of discovery. When Voyager did its 'Grand Tour' of the Solar System, we finally saw what planets looked like. In all of human history, there hadn't been a picture of the earth until the late 60's. There hadn't been a picture of anything else in the Sol System until a generation later. KSP1 makes you work, and think, and experiment, earn your achievements, but it's still a videogame. You can exploit the rules of the game to get extra science points. You do it well enough, you can unlock the whole tech tree before you reach Duna. You want to see those planets, you can click on the map screen and scroll in. It'd be awesome if there were some unlockables that depended on specific missions or destinations. Nothing pivotal, because the point of the game is to make your individual way, but this game would be superior to KSP1 if you had a sense of 'And now we'll see what's there' and made it rewarding to the rest of the program.

Today, I began a Career Mode play. I've only ever played Science Mode before. It's a totally different style this time around. I've gotten as far as an orbit of Mun and I've taken three tourist flights to build up my cash reserves. I'm trying to figure out how to get a contract to land on the Mun. I still have the early-tech Landers from my Science playthrough, so I'm ready, I just don't want to do it for free.

I think the question of megaships will depend (at least partially) on the way orbital construction works. We know the Interstellar ships are too big to be built on the ground, even in sections. We know that you can 'design' whole ships in completed form, even if you don't launch it as one complete piece. Maybe mega-sized ships can be designed as single entities, and then the game remembers that enough that they can be rigid on assembly.

I don't get to play every day, but I've more or less 'completed' my Science game. My ship, (The SS Lewis) has been unlocking most of the tech tree. I finally made a halfway decent Digger, and made several round trips to Ike, so I was able to refuel and fly the whole thing straight past Kerbin, and on to Eve. I wasn't sue I had the Delta-V, so I left my Digger/Refueller (Unmanned) on Ike. I figured if anything ever flew that way again, I could use it as a fuel station. I started the flight from Duna to Eve, and then went back to the space centre. My Digger (Complete with Booster) is saved, so I launched another and flew it to Eve. It got there independently of the Lewis, and I landed Digger2 on Gilly; ready to start refuelling as soon as the Mothership got there. My Lander doesn't have the power to get off Eve again if I landed, but Gilly is another story. With a Science Lab, and a few scientists on my crew to let me reuse experiments and EVA's at various biomes, I've not unlocked the whole tech tree. I have no idea what to do now. I've successfully flown a 35 year mission around three planets; and unlocked the tree. I've never successfully run a 'Career' Save. Maybe I'll use my Science Game to design a few rockets with appropriate cost saving/early parts; give myself a leg-up on the Career path.

Some games are just fun amusements, some games are part of the culture because everyone knows them... Some games influence people. I've read at least a dozen posts from people who say: "I got interested because of KSP, and I just started my internship at NASA/SpaceX/Blue Origin." To say nothing of Instagram showing Jeb toys going to space. Plenty of soccer stars started out playing in their backyard; but it's not the same with computer games. I bought KSP years ago, but I only got serious about playing it a few months ago, and now I'm on this board every day. The learning curve and the complexity weeds out a lot of casual players. And it looks like KSP2 has revamped the tutorials for that reason; so we may be having a huge influx of people this time next year. Which means ten years from now, instead of a dozen posts bragging about working in spaceflight, there'll be hundreds. The Kerbal Effect, 2.0. There aren't many computer games that do that.

Colonies, and Orbital Construction, more than anything else.

Today, after a surprising number of failed attempts, I sent my updated Digger to Duna. For a while now, I've been trying to crack 'refuelling' my main ship. I wasn't sure which way would work best: Flying ore up to my ship from Ike, or converting it on the surface and flying the fuel up. I tried the latter first, sending a lander with a large Convert-O-Tron. Dock the converter with the main ship, then send the lander down. That first attempt was a failure, since after flying up a load of Ore, I ended up using more fuel making the trip than I got back. Fortunately, after landing a full science lander on Duna and Ike, and then flying it all to a ship with a Lab, I've been harvesting hundreds of science points at time, and unlocked larger fuel tanks, and larger Ore Containers. So today, I sent my second 'Mining' Lander to Duna. This one has a small Converter of it's own, and a large Ore tank. I ran close to the limits getting it to Duna, and landed on Ike with less than 25 Delta-V left, but after that I just cranked up my Drill and refilled my tanks, then refilled the Ore container. The first, sub-standard Mining lander at least let me Dock a larger (And I think more efficient) Converter. If you remember me at all, you know that my Main Ship (The SS Lewis, long may she fly) is basically a Lab and some Crew spaces mounted on the front of three 'into orbit' boosters that are refuelled and docked together, plus docking spaces for Landers and cargo pods. It's almost becoming tedious, but my new Lander lets me add 200 Delta-V per flight to my Main Ship. Enough to get me to Gilly. My current Crew Lander doesn't have the boosters to get me off Eve, but we can do a flyby, then land my Digger on Gilly and unlock the rest of the entire Tech Tree. I achieve that, I'll build an upsized version of this ship, with bigger fuel tanks, larger landers, and a SSTO that I can dock, and try my luck with the Outer Planets. Also, is there any point to science points once you've unlocked everything? Is there any reason to take a Lab on my next ship?

We've reached the point where the kids who grew up watching Star Trek and playing KSP are now going to Space. I'm betting we were all that kid.

I'm playing around with the idea of a 'mothership' that can land. Duna and Eve both have low-gravity moons that I can harvest for refuelling, but the amount of fuel I would get for ore in a lander means it could be easier to land the whole thing than carry ore up to the ship. My problem is, how to get a ship that size that can control decent-ascent vertically? So far, my (untested) idea is to put the engines on a rotor and work it like a Harrier Jump Jet. I just don't know if I can still run them if they rotate. Do I need a fuel line somehow? Is there a range on how far they can turn before they get cut off from the fuel tank?

I did, but I hadn't unlocked the large ore container yet. I adapted with a dozen small ones around the fuel tank in a ring, but to keep the weight down, I don't have a converted included in the lander itself. I think my lander is just too small and low powered. How much weight can landing legs support? I've heard people suggest just landing the whole ship. If I want to do that, I need a whole new mothership.

Today in Kerbal, I built a Lander with a dozen small ore tanks, and mounted a large convertor on top. I flew it from Kerbal to Duna, and docked the converter onto my 'mothership'. I detatched the lander and flew it down to Ike to start harvesting ore. The problem is, when the storage filled up, I had barely enough Delta-V left to get into Orbit. The fuel I got after redocking was worth about as much fuel as I had just used landing and taking off again in the lander. I'm still relatively new at this game. I need to reassess how to refuel completely when away from Kerbin.