Scarecrow71

While I think it is awesome that the forums are back, and while I can appreciate that you personally had nothing to do with anything... ...I find it hard to believe that the technical team doesn't know what happened. For the first week(ish) we saw error EX1146 anytime we tried to do anything. Then it was just the generic "An error has occurred" page. Again, this isn't on you, but rather on the continued lack of communication from TT and their team. It makes no sense that we all saw the EX1146 and can Google what it means...yet they can't tell us what happened, or why/how, or what they did to fix it, or what they plan to do to keep it from happening again?

Today I completed the Caveman challenge on EASY. Due to the difficulty of the challenge, I'm only providing the bare minimum of screenshots (Settings, Tech Tree, Science Archives, KSC). I only needed 4 total launches (not including the science roller) to get this done; 200% science is way too much. Anyhow, the shots: In game this ended up being Day 2, 4 hours, 33 minutes. I could have probably gone faster than that, but I wasn't going for the speed run. Next up: Moderate!

The DLC's are quite ok and have been for some time. I'm not sure why yours was marked differently.

@Ultimate Steve Unfortunately, you can't even have them installed. I verified that for my Normal run years ago. So you will in fact need a clean install for this.

I updated the thread title to just say "Caveman Challenges". I completed HARD on this run-through, and I have previously finished NORMAL. I'm going to go back and do EASY and MODERATE...and then I might work on DIAMOND. I want to see now if I can get all of them completed so I can add myself to the Order of the Trilobite. If you read the post, you will see that I finished this! I want to use that save to do a flyby of Dres, just to say I can. But it is done!

I missed that! Ooga Booga! Go grab that Apatite badge!

This is entirely possible. I'm no modder for this game, so I can't say for certain if it's true or not. But it is possible. KSP itself has a memory leak issue. It's well-documented, and in fact has a thread that was created just recently in the Suggestions sub-forum. This is the most likely cause of the situation. There are numerous mods out there that are either broken OR don't play nice with others. For example - and I'm not saying you have this mod - Tweakscale is broken. I suggest going through your mods and see if you can figure out which one(s) is/are causing the issue. Easiest way is to install half of them and see what happens. If the issue doesn't crop up, you know it's in second half. If it does, it's in the first half. Then chop the half that failed in half and do again. Rinse and repeat until you figure out which mod is causing the issue. Warning: If the issue is that multiple mods are conspiring at the same time this method may not help to identify the issue.

@DennisB I've gone through the last page, and I am happy to award you the badge for Vanadium (Moderate)! Ooga Booga! You can go ahead and claim the badge with the appropriate mineral-shaped object in it! Unfortunately, you don't have any screenshots for your settings, research, or the KSC from your Apatite (Normal) run, so I cannot give you credit for that one at this time. If you provide the shots, or if you re-do the challenge, we can discuss getting you that Apatite badge! @king of nowhere Were you not already a member of the Order of the Trilobite, you would have received this honor for your Nano-Diamond/Kerbalism run with a landing on Duna. Well done! For those who wish to read about this achievement, you can do so here: @Sirad I am thoroughly blown away from your mission to land a Kerbal on Tylo and return them home in Caveman. The ship you constructed, both on the ground and in orbit, is nothing short of remarkable. Were you not already a member of the Order of the Trilobyte, you would have earned that here. For anyone that wants to read/see the mission, you can do so here:

My guess is that it's one or more of the mods you are using. Can you build a completely stock craft, no Buzzard engine, no Proteus advanced command pod, and see what happens? What happens if you uninstall every mod (I'm assuming you have a clean install of KSP somewhere on your rig)?

I'm wondering if this happens with any vessel you launch, or just a specific one. You mentioned: Does it always happen with this vessel? Does it happen with any other vessels/craft? Can you give a screenshot of the craft that it is crashing on in the VAB, with the Engineer's Report displayed? Secondarily to this, but maybe just as important: What mods do you have installed? Did you install any recently? Did you remove any recently? Are you installing/uninstalling through cKAN? Have you tried verifying the integrity of the files (assuming you are on Steam or Epic)?

I am honored and humbled to bring to you, all of our fellow Kerbonauts, the 6th iteration of the Kerbal Space Program Caveman challenge. I would love to have gotten the blessing of either @JAFO or @Mr. Peabody, but neither has been on the forum in quite a long time. So in order to keep this challenge going and active - which is one of my personal favorites, btw - I have decided to just take over administrative duties. I hope this is ok, and if it is not, then may the kraken strike down any craft I attempt to fly. NOTE: If anyone has completed the Caveman challenge under any of the previous threads but has not received recognition, please post herein with a link to your mission report or post(s) from the other threads proving you have finished this. I will go through and validate any and all who request it! KSP Caveman Challenge Facility upgrades are forbidden. Terrible runway and launchpad. Part count of thirty and vehicle mass limit of 18.0 tons. No fancy patched conics, no maneuver nodes and no Deep Space Network. Abhorrent fear of technology as primitive as can be. Acquire 1188 Science Points to unlock twenty nodes of the technology tree. Challenge Rules: Stock career mode (DLC expansions are allowed) EVA construction is allowed and even encouraged Use of Green Monoliths to unlock tech nodes is allowed No mods that alter game play (mods used for graphics, radio chatter, ect. are fine) Use of the KER and/or MechJeb mods, or other mods that provide more information than the stock game does, is not permitted The Making History option "Allow other Launchsites" is not permitted (it makes Caveman life too easy) No use of Mods or Cheat Menu in separate games No cheat menus or any other shenanigans No kraken/ladder drives or similar contraptions Use of spreadsheets and/or external launch window calculators such as the Alex Moon Launch Window Planner, are permitted The minimum amount of proof needed for a challenge entry is screen shots of: Your difficulty settings. (Including advanced/custom settings if needed.) Your Science Archives, showing where the bulk of your science came from. The KSC to show no buildings were upgraded. Your tech tree to show that you completed Tier 5. However, we strongly encourage you to also post interesting screenshots in occasional updates to this thread. It's always fun (and interesting!) to see the different approaches people take to the challenge. Help Resources: Previous challenge threads are the best compilations of previous attempts and useful information, but there are some other places you should check out as well. For your convenience, they are all listed below. There are 7 levels of challenge to aspire to, and one Special Award: TALC: Complete Challenge in Easy Career Mode You should be able to make quick work of this soft-rock career Apatite: Complete Challenge in Normal Career Mode The minimum amount of flare. Vanadium: Complete Challenge in Moderate Career Mode A tool's hard edge can make all the difference. Topaz: Complete Challenge in Hard Career Mode Happy, shiny caveman. Corundum: Custom Difficulty This career would not wear down a tough caveman... Diamond: Custom Difficulty For brilliant cavemen, possessed of fire. Nano-crystalline Diamond: Custom Difficulty Hard caveman. Good luck, you'll need it! The Trilobitic Order Legendary cavemen & cavewomen Badges:

So, I’m going to try doing yet another Caveman challenge on HARD. I tried this recently, and the science bottomed out. Didn’t help that I took a contract for the Thud engine, which simply does not work the way you want it to. And because I could never complete that contract, I was stuck with only 1 contract slot. Which sucks. So, I’m starting over. Anyhow, the settings: Tiers I & II Tier III Tier IV Tier V Jeb is a happy Kerbal right now. He absolutely approves of this run!

Most of the time, this game gives me general enjoyment and a sense of "Hey, I like doing this". Some times, this game leaves me in absolute shock and awe at what can be done with even a bit of determination. Today, I was left so blown away I'm not sure how to appropriately put it into words. I'm in the midst of doing a Caveman run on HARD. Why? Why not, not why. Seriously, though, I like to push myself and try new things. Can I do this? Can I make the lessened science points work? You know, all of that good stuff. Combine that with the fact that someone needs to take over administering the Caveman Challenge (neither of the previous administrators of it have been logged onto the forums in months), and I thought "Yeah, I'll take up that mantle". So here I am, working on my Caveman challenge on HARD. At the start of today, I had 4 nodes on Tier V to go. 360 more science and I'm done. And I'm running out of ideas, so I think to myself "You know, I can get to the Mun. And Minmus. And I have a satellite in Kerbolar orbit. But can I go interplanetary?". So I fired up KSP and got into my save game, and time-warped until I got a decent enough angle for Eve. I wanted Duna, but the Eve transfer window was closer: With this transfer window, I decided I could give it a shot. I've got a craft that I used to get that satellite into Kerbolar orbit, but with a few tweaks I was able to get this: So I launch into LKO, and then do a Kerbin-retrograde burn to transfer to Eve. Note: due to the Caveman parameters, I cannot see orbit lines outside of my current SOI (which, in this case, was Kerbin). So I burned long enough to get into Kerbolar orbit, then once I got there had to do 2 correction burns: one to get an Eve intercept, and one to match (mostly) inclination. Lo and behold, an Eve fly-by. I did another burn to cash out all the fuel I had, and ended up with a Pe at ~135km. 135km! That got me close enough to get science in both high and low Eve orbit. I brought 2 goo cannisters, but only 1 science jr. Still, I did it. This craft is out of fuel, and it is not in orbit of Eve, so it will, eventually, leave Eve's SOI and become yet another satellite in Kerbolar orbit. But 18 tons, 30 parts, and I got an interplanetary fly-by with it. I'm going to warp to a Duna transfer window next. I did Eve, so I know I can do Duna. I wonder if I can get out any farther than that, though. Moho? Dres? Could I potentially get to Jool? Either way, I went interplanetary - with no landing, of course - in Caveman. On HARD. Which I did not do in my NORMAL run. Dang!

For a group of people who are all on record prior to this as saying they were here for good, and they loved the game, and they loved interacting with the fanbase? Yeah, a lack of coming here isn't really all that cool. And I expressed that I understood NDA's; I think you might have missed that in my post. I get that they can't say very specific things. But for them to completely disappear after professing how much they loved the franchise? Looks kind of bad.

So I'm winding my way through another run for the Caveman challenge, and I'm working on HARD. I had to start over at one point as the amount of science just completely bottomed out. Now I find myself with 5 nodes to go on Tier V, and I can smell the finish line. But I've got a question on something that might make getting these last 450 science points a bit easier. I have finished constructing a craft on the launchpad (central stack on the launchpad, roll side tanks and other finishing parts from the runway over to the launchpad and finish building the craft). Using that technique, I was able to land a probe on Minmus and return to Kerbin; full details will be in the eventual mission profile I'll submit in the challenge thread. Anyhow, this was a long and tedious process, and one I do not wish to have to repeat if I can absolutely avoid it. This leaves orbital construction the only other potential way to build craft large enough to get to and land on other bodies. But I'm stuck on part of this, and need the help of the community. In non-Caveman runs, I use maneuver nodes to do rendezvous; I am good at moving the nodes and tweaking them to get the right amount of separation. I can then reduce speed enough and dock manually using the "Matt Lowne Lazy Docking Method". So these aren't my issues. My issue is doing a rendezvous without having access to maneuver nodes. Without being able to upgrade the tracking station or mission control (or any buildings for that matter), I'm stuck on doing an orbital rendezvous. I've tried looking for tutorials on how to do this, but every tutorial I've seen includes instructions for using nodes and/or MJ to do the rendezvous for you. And I can't use either of those in this run. I really want to learn how to eyeball this, so I am here to ask the community: Are there any tutorials or guides out there on how to do an orbital rendezvous without using maneuver nodes, MechJeb, or any other technology? I am aware of orbital speed; the ship in lower orbit travels faster than the ship in higher orbit. And if I could I would just trial-and-error this, but I have no access to quicksave/reload OR reverting flights. If someone out there can point me to some tips, a guide, a tutorial, a video...anything...that can help me do these, I would truly appreciate it. Thanks in advance, and happy flying all!

I'll start by saying that I completely understand the concept and implementation of NDA's. And that I also understand that a lot of the developers, CM's, and even Nate himself, have avoided coming to the site for multiple reasons, not the least of which could very well be said NDA's (not to mention the vitriol and hatred that would be thrown their way). And I'll further expand on this by saying that, while the forums are a great resource for this franchise, it's not the end-all of social media and engagement for the franchise. That all said, I think it's a pretty damning statement that nobody from the team comes here any longer. Dakota recently posted in this thread for the first time since the layoffs, and neither Mike nor Nate have been on the site since before the layoffs. Nertea is active in the modding section. But still no word from anyone on what happened, or why. One of the CM's and the Creative Director for KSP2 aren't even here any longer. I think that says more than enough about how they felt about the franchise and the community. It's insulting, really.

I'm not a console player, so take what I say with a grain or three of salt. It sounds like the save file from the PS4 version simply got corrupted in some fashion, which can happen with any console game due to power spikes, resets during play, or any other number of console issues. As far as the PS5 version not even launching, your only recourse there is to try and work with the support team to find out why the newly downloaded copy doesn't launch. Incorrect. Take Two owns the intellectual property for all things Kerbal, which means they are, legally, the only entity that can work on the code for either product.

@Tris_The What ColdJ said above. The only way to fix the memory leak issue is to get under the hood and rewrite the sections of code that deal with this. Modders can come close, like they did with the Community Fixes. But without access to the actual source? Not going to happen. Doesn't mean it's not an issue, but rather it's unfixable unless Take Two wants to make the code public and open source.

Well, this thread aged like warm milk.

This. All of this. I use MJ for all of the menial tasks, like ascent or maneuver nodes. I can do those things, and when I feel like being masochistic I just do a Caveman run (like I'm doing now on Hard). But normal games? I'm using MJ as soon as I possibly can (which means when Mission Control and Tracking Station both get upgraded AND I've unlocked Flight Control).

So, it's ok to use one mod but not another? I say "good for one, good for all". Then again, I also want everyone to play how they want to play. You do you. It isn't my place to tell anyone how or why they should play, only that they should play in whatever way brings them the most joy and fulfillment.

Continuing on with my attempt at a HARD Caveman challenge, I got contracts to test stuff while splashed down. I misjudged the buoyancy of the probe, and so it starts to sink. I look directly at it...and realize I can see Kerbol THROUGH THE CENTER OF KERBIN WHILE UNDERWATER.

My problem here is that I want to LAND on Minmus, not just fly-by. I've seen all of these people out here do all these cool things in the Caveman challenge...and I can't. No matter what I try I'm just not, for whatever reason, getting it done. It's frustrating considering on Normal difficulty I can do almost anything I can think of. Why am I having such a difficult time on HARD? My other major issue here is that I cannot find a tutorial on how to rendezvous without having any upgraded buildings. Everything I'm finding uses maneuver nodes and patched conics, which I don't have access to in this career. Everyone says "Well, you really should learn how to do it". Yeah, I know how to do it with maneuver nodes. But I can't find anything to help me learn how to do this without them.

Say hello to...

I'm trying to avoid heavy part clipping with this one. But I may give this a serious look.