Vagrant203

RE: SciFiVE It's installed and not hurting performance. At least noticeably. As for operations, things continue to be... Interesting. After a test flight ended in a bad wreck (one I couldn't revert because the Escape menu wouldn't come up) Val and Bill have been, ah, briefly indisposed. Perhaps even more frustrating, I think they'll have lost their one star after their return. In the meantime, I sent Bob up in an orbiter with a probe cores attached. The core being a Stayputnik was countered by my use of MechJeb. Science was gathered and he got his star, but I accidentally staged the final engine away BEFORE the deorbit. I sent another probe up. Tossed a few tourists up with it. Managed to nudge the orbiter out of orbit with RCS. Switched to him to deploy chutes, then back to the tourists to bring them down. If something goes wrong, Bob can come back. Tourists don't. Lo and behold, despite pre-arming the chutes, Bob is now MIA. This bloody stupid [multiple expletives redacted] HOW HARD IS IT TO CHECK FOR ACTIVE CHUTES AND CALCULATE SURVIVAL?! Krakens sake!

"Why wasn't that me?" Gatdang Kenlie. You went right for the psyche.

I'll take another look at it, but my computer crawls already. Maybe it won't make a significant difference.

Hello again. It's been an eventful few days for myself and the KSC. The payload was confirmed down by direct observation of Jeb. Hmm, telemetry seems to report negative 14 AGL; strange. After the extensive series of fruitless tests, Jeb made an executive decision and diverted to the Island Airfield for some R&R. The poor kerb is so done he doesn't even blink at something detonating behind him; not his problem. Relaxing at an old hangout he and his sister Val used to spend days at. Used Map View to target the probe. It's still there. At least it was until Flight Tracking focused on the payload again. The telemetry reported two meters above ground, then negative 14, followed instantly by loss of signal and detonation. The other three crew threw together an odd contraption. Engineering refers to it as a Valentina Special. Science would only say it proved useful. Val calls it The Mutiny. To my face. I probably deserve that level of spiteful sass though, so I just watch as the three of them fly a box of snacks and recreational supplies out to the newly established Island Republic. I'm told the national anthem is just a chorus demanding I eat their shorts. The four discuss the events surrounding the mountain. The pilot siblings now declare the mountain is cursed. Engineering doesn't agree or disagree, only confirms the events. Science convinces Val to include some scientific equipment on The Mutiny. Some data was gathered en route to the Republic. Afterwards, Science convinced Val that another attempt should be made in her craft. No photos exist of the following independent mission. Neither Val nor Science have uttered a word about what happened up there. Some time later, The Mutiny was recovered, missing all four of the pseudo tilt props, but containing uninjured kerbs and the scientific data available atop the mountains. No further expeditions will be mounted to the newly christened Accursed Mounds. In a strange reversal, Science no longer vehemently denies the existence of a curse. They won't specifically confirm anything either, but a solemn nod of apparent agreement has been observed at every reference to the new name. I mean, if Science ain't arguing the curse angle, the evidence must have been pretty strong though.

Um. I may be talking out my rear since I've only recently started playing, but here is my theoretical approach to future bases and missions. To begin with, I plan on a crew of six. Two of each specialty. Two scientists to man an orbital lab. Two engineers to man a drill unit and an orbital refinery. Two pilots to man a mk1-3 command pod, this enabling its use as a probe control point independent of CommNet. The vessel will consist of, at least, the command pod, an ISRU refinery, and a lab, along with two side mounted 2.5m tanks and engines, likely Poodles for the efficiency. There will be a docking port at the aft, enabling other modules to be docked and pulled by this main vessel. Theoretically, this vessel should be able to serve as a forward control point and refueling station, providing a foundation for establishing further infrastructure. I haven't been able to test these theories as of yet, since I insist on using a career to establish all of this. You are more than welcome to try though.

That may be difficult but probably doable. Thanks for the tip.

Aaah. Yuh, that was the problem.

Yesss. I am... Aware of those facts. The only icons off were debris and flags. The payloads were equipped with probe cores to avoid debris status. A second attempt today. Redesigned around a single payload. Switched to it to ensure the parachute deployed, then back to the plane. Checked on map screen while still flying and... It wasn't there. I even put an antenna on this time, despite planning to simply recover it. Does it need an engine too? What the FOXTROT am I missing? Screw it, I'll just make a crappy little RC plane.

Does this serve as a probe control point like the mk2 lander can? That would give me a nice alternative to using a mk1-3 for a particular concept.

I've been trying to find a good mod for science collection, and then I find the experiment lights here. That's a great solution rather than trying to find a toolbar that may or may not have hit 1.8.1 yet. Beautiful in its simplicity.

no u

All of the links in the original thread that I checked gave me a "does not exist" message.

Well, that savefile also died an inexplicable death. Got an error saying something about value can't be null. And I hadn't changed mods. Eh, whatever. Got a new one going, with mods including Snacks and MechJeb (since my computer is crappy enough to lag for most of my play time, I like having a helmsman rather than trying to manually compensate.) The station concept will definitely make a comeback, and I'll post anything else I think is interesting when it happens. Oh, I just managed to upgrade the SPH to two, so I'm moments from launching a plane with wingtip mounted science packages to be dropped on the mountains to the north and... Somewhere else, I dunno. So, I'll probably edit this post again unless someone else posts first. Or bloody not. Keeps yawing on me. Almost every plane does this until I tweak something and it magically works suddenly. [three hours later] Well. I finally relearned how to make a plane that actually functions, what with [REDACTED] gears having to be JUST RIGHT. Finally manage to fly to AND OVER the mountains. Drop one probe. Everything goes sideways, literally. I manage to not crash, fly a bit more, then lag hits as I try to drop the second [REDACTED] thing. Pop the emergency chutes. Slide to a stable stop. Recover. Go to tracking center. NEITHER OF THE LITTLE [REDACTED] ARE SHOWING UP. WHISKEY. TANGO. FOXTROT. OVER.

This is pretty gotdang epic. If I ever manage to keep a career save going to where I've got everything unlocked and a self sustainable crewed ship, this is definitely next.

Hey all. I'm a relatively new player, just got KSP on the first of this year. Been lurking but haven't joined till now cause I didn't think I'd have anything to say. But then, a situation developed. I had a contract to take some tourists up to space. Well, a couple, enough to warrant slapping two Hitchhiker cans on top of a big ol rocket. Simple enough. I also have a sort of wandering station concept in the works. Just a Mk1-3 pod, a mk2 can and a science lab with two side mounted 2.5m tanks and Skipper engines. (And some other necessary bits and bobs I had to shove into a service bay and send up after.) But those tanks are near dry, which makes it hard to wander anywhere beyond a slightly different orbit. Ooh, I know, let's over engineer this tourbus and transfer the rest of the fuel! That worked great. And then I realized a problem. No fuel, no deorbit. Well, I had to think for a minute or two, but then it hit me. The docking port is on the bottom of the stack, so that the lead module is pulling everything else as it's added. So I whipped around to apoapsis, briefly dropped the periapsis of the whole shebang to 35km, then undocked the bus and scooted a bit away with RCS before whipping back around to burn my periapsis back up to a hundred km. Switched over to the tourbus, spun and decoupled my final engine stage, and from there it was a standard reentry. So that's what I consider my first interesting KSP story. Some panicked improvisation and slightly unconventional methods. Not much, but I'm just getting started.