OJT

I decided to have a crack at this as well. Why not, I haven't played KSP in quite a while, might aswell shed off some rust with this. Playing on Normal difficulty with CommNet on First: gathering science to unlock the steaming pile of junk Stayputnik. I did three roller cruises: one with Mystery Goo from Launchpad across the grass (which counted as Shores biome) to Runway. Then I unlocked the Thermometer and Barometer and did the same route again and then did the Runway-to-SPH-to-VAB route to gather the last piece of science I needed to unlock first probe core. I actually gathered a bit more science points than I would need, so I took the liberty to unlock some extra stuff for future endeavors First attempt at suborbital: failed. Stayputnik, turns out, has no reaction wheels and its shape proved to be more blunt than I anticipated and the rocket flipped. Thankfully, I saved it with parachutes and did some in-flight science while descending Second attempt at suborbital: partial failure. I addressed the issues of first rocket with some of newly unlocked parts. I did reach space and I did conduct science there, but in the efforts of trying to make the whole rocket recoverable I kinda forgot that passive aerodynamic stability works both ways and the rocket plummeted into the ocean at Mach 2 Third time's the charm: I decided to shelve reusability for now and simply made the science capsule detach before reentry. Mission successful and LKO science recovered I unlocked a better probe core and attempted to reach orbit to get contract money and I also accepted the contract to test Terrier engine to unlock it early First attempt failed: SRB burned off too early and second stage flipped due to aero instability. Saved it with parachutes Second attempt (with liquid fuel 1st stage) was successful, albeit with thinner margins than I planned After unlocking first reaction wheel and better winglets I built the Mun rocket. It simply made a fly-by of the Mun and returned to Kerbin on free return trajectory. Gained some science from space near Mun, but most importantly I earned good money from it which I could utilize for KSC upgrades After that I mostly spent my time doing contracts (Haul Part X to Y, Test Part Z and so on) Most successful launch of the day was this satellite: it did two satellite contracts, Mun Orbit contract and Minmus Temperature Survey contracts all in a single launch, earning lots of moolah for the "Probe Go Brrr" Space Program Here's my KSC and Tech Tree after yesterday's shenanigans. Let's see how it goes today

Not OP, but I'd argue that is even more dangerous for Kerbals if they have no means of controlling the vessel . So I assume that tourist contracts are also off table

Yea, I'll figure something out. It's more about doing these challenges while still conforming to self-imposed Mk.2 rules, but that one is on me

So from what I understood I do need to haul 4 fuel pods during demonstration flights Hauling at least 120 tons of mass from Minmus to LKO... that's gonna be one hell of a tanker

I was reading through the requirements for new Minmus missions and I had a question Missions require you to build a refinery, orbital facility and a tanker that can haul 2 or 4 fuel pods (depending on the rank) and it also gives the specs for the fuel pod. However, it says can, not must. Does it mean that I can, for example, build a tanker that can haul 4 fuel pods, but do the missions themselves with only one fuel pod? Or do I need to launch all 4 fuel pods in missions MINMUS STS-5-6?

Well if you accept specific requests, I imagined my Orbiter from Duna Series flying over Kerbin with Duna and Jool behind Kerbin (sort of like Mun badges where Kerbin is placed behind the Mun) Looking forward to seeing it! Well, both the orbiter and the badge

You gotta be joking right? This can't be real. What's next, sand dunes changing shapes during dust storms? This looks lit!

Stop being such a tease then and release it already I'm not much of a coding-savvy guy, but I am still interested in how you managed to remove 4/5 of the lines and still achieve the same result as before. Different algorithms? Shortcuts that you didn't know at the time you wrote the original code?

There's already a system for it: sturmhauke simply makes a special badge with a ribbon beneath it, on which the planet pack is written. One of the users got these types of badges for their RSS submissions (I think it was Entropian?)

Well, the rules do state that modded planet pack submissions are allowed and will even get special badges for completing missions, but I assume it is @sturmhauke's area of expertise, so to say

My question was more in the direction of "Will that rock's collider be the same size as its visual model/texture consistently?". Because I was occasionally having some issues with exactly that in Beyond Home

I've been following your latest developments so far. All of this looks mad impressive. However I do have some questions about all this First: My stock planets save is without Parallax. I do have Parallax on my Beyond Home save and I did notice that object spawn and colliders are not always consistent, going from trees spawning in the air and ending with some rocks having way bigger colliders than their visible size would suggest (to the point that I actually lost a plane on Hydrus because it apparently collided with a rock that was nowhere near my plane). I was wondering how consistent the colliders are in these newer versions of Parallax. Or the problems I've encountered have mostly to do with different solar system and in stock solar system it works fine? Second: I understand that these new Parallax features will make the surfaces of planetary bodies much more closer to reality. However, I also suspect that new colliders will also make landing planes much harder. Big part of what makes KSP fun for me is designing and flying planes that are adapted for different gravitational and atmospheric conditions and, even though making landable plane for a spot that is littered with rocks is an interesting challenge in itself, I fear that new colliders might take some pure "gameplay" fun out of it, if you catch my meaning. I am curious if the collider feature will be adjustable, if it will be biome dependent (say, Lowland plains having less rocks than Midlands) of if there will be an outright different version of new Parallax without any colliders whatsoever? All in all, fantastic stuff mate. Keep it up!

Hello lads, another STS Mission Report here. But this time, it is in Linx' Beyond Home planet pack: STS-1 Rhode-Lua Mission Report Both the Orbiter and the Launcher are made out of stock parts (albeit with Restock visuals, but these still count as stock )

Hello people, long time no see I was fairly inactive in the forum in general. Partly due to IRL stuff, but also because I was mainly playing Beyond Home planet pack and because vast majority of the challenges are aimed towards stock planets, I didn't have much reason to post here. However, STS Challenge thread does allow custom planet packs, and because of that I decided to put together a lil sumthin sumthin. Introducing: Rhode-Lua STS-1 Rhode is the home planet of Beyond Home planet pack. It is slightly smaller than Kerbin and has slightly less dense atmosphere. The main feature of Rhode however is that it has three (yes, three) moons with vastly different features and characteristics. In this mission we will be going to the nearest moon: Lua. Lua is a very unique moon: it has thin atmosphere, is partially terraformed (according to in-mod lore) and it also has its own (fully usable) launchpad and runway! So to flex our capabilities, we will be landing on Lua Runway, deploy a payload and return back to Rhode and land on KSC Runway Here's our craft, still adhering to Mk.2 rules Here's the payload: a small unmanned rocket that can launch from Lua sea level and reach its orbit Here's the Launcher: SRB first stage and Poodle-powered second stage Launch and ascent to orbit Burning towards Lua Approaching Lua and entering low orbit around it. I could aerobrake, but I had enough fuel to circularize, so I engaged the engine After doing my deorbit burn, I decoupled the transfer stage and glided towards the runway Runway was just over the hill, so I briefly turned on the engine to not crash into it Now was the hardest part of the mission: actually sticking the landing. My velocity was still way too big, atmosphere was too thin for my wings to provide enough lift and due to runway not being perfectly aligned with equator I was approaching it at a slight angle. For this purpose I packed up some parachutes but even with those the landing was on thin margins: I briefly went over runway surface during braking but I steered my way back to it And we are landed on Lua! Time to deploy our payload rocket Our mini rocket launches and reaches orbit around Lua with around 700 m/s deltaV left for future orbit adjustments In the meanwhile, Bill repacks the parachutes, and the Orbiter taxies for a bit to get more space to accelerate Launch. I baaaarely made it off ground, but in the end we reached orbit After one orbit, we burn towards Rhode Reentering Rhode's atmosphere KSC runway was, unfortunately, on the other side of the planet, so I basically had to glide around half the globe (with periodically burning to extend the glide) to reach it Smooth landing on the runway And this concludes another STS mission, this time on another star system!

Like, I think I am pretty decent at the game, and then I see stuff like this and think to myself "What am I even doing?" This is mindbreaking

Having basically explored the whole stock Solar System several times over, I decided to get myself a different planet pack and start a new playthrough @Gameslinx Beyond Home is a total blast! I haven't got far yet due to starting relatively recently and playing on Career Hard mode, but the stuff I've seen so far has been nothing but amazing There were some minor, non-gameplay-breaking issues I've encountered along the way. I also had some questions about the functionality of some game mechanics (like, for example, Anomaly detection). But I feel like most, if not all of them, have been already asked/addressed in this thread. I was wondering if there was any FAQ/Troubleshooting checklist for Beyond Home that I can search through before going through the hassle of searching through the entire thread?

Time for another "Kerbalized" replica. This time it is XB70 Initially I build the atmospheric version with 6 Panthers to test the in-flight stability and, seeing that it worked, I scrambled an SSTO version with 4 RAPIERs and 2 NERVAs Ascent to orbit was a bit tricky due to low heat tolerance of Mk1 Cockpit. First part of the ascent was at relatively steep angle: high TWR from RAPIERs allowed me to raise the periapsis high enough while gaining good speed. After that I continued with NERVAs all the way into orbit. I actually was briefly falling back into the thicker atmosphere at one point, but we made it in the end After reaching orbit we are descending back down and landing on KSC runway At this point I have enough backstage passes to sell some off on the Internet for a quick buck

I hate to be the party pooper. And don't get me wrong, Alpaca Z's video is mighty impressive (as is Lt.Duckweed's craft). But the submission clearly breaks Rule 7 on Tylo landing because due to landing approach no kerbal could leave the craft and then climb back into it again. I'm afraid you'll have to knock it down to Honourable Mentions @JacobJHC

Introducing PLEN GO DUN Ascent is as usual. Ignore the wrong name in first couple of pictures: this plane was initially a failed "SSTO to Moho" concept and while making changes for Duna trip I forgot to rename it. I did rename it when I got to orbit Travelling to Duna. Transfer burn was split into several parts Approaching Duna, about to aerobrake I did two aerobrakes, one to capture into Duna orbit and another one to get into suborbital trajectory I picked a spot to land: a huge plain near equator which is barely above the Duna Sea Level, so air is thick enough to get lift on wings My visual mods meant that there was what I could only describe as a dust storm at my landing site so visibility was not great. After a bit of gliding I raised my nose a bit to reduce descent speed as much as I could As soon as wheels touched the surface I engaged the brakes and slowed down And here we are! No Airbrakes, no parachutes, no reverse thrust, ultimate flex Takeoff and ascent back to Duna orbit Returning to Kerbin after waiting for transfer window Two aerobrakes bring me into a suborbital trajectory After slowing down enough I point prograde and glide until I reach the KSC. I had to briefly engage the engines on the way Approaching KSC Smooth landing Jeb sends his regards

This challenge got into Honourable Mentions for the Thread of the Month! I wanna thank everyone who took part in it so far and who nominated the thread! And we're gonna celebrate it with the first Level 3+++ ship of this thread! Fat launch platform and a lander with a Swivel. I chose Swivel for the lander because it has good TWR in atmosphere, somewhat decent ISP in vacuum, has thrust vectoring AND an alternator for electricity generation Ascent was vertical up to around 18-20km and then I slowly started turning prograde. The reason for late turning is high drag of the craft. If I start the gravity turn lower in the atmosphere the craft spins around and loses control I did fairly well with the launch: after disconnecting the lander I only needed around 250m/s burn to enter stable orbit Burning towards Duna. I also turned on my TUFX for eyecandy Approaching Duna after small midcourse correction Direct entry into atmosphere and we landed in Highlands of Duna Jeb marking his landing spot Takeoff into Duna orbit Burning towards Kerbin Approaching Kerbin. I had to do three aerobrakes to slowdown for landing. One of them was during a solar eclipse, it looked surreal Approaching surface and landing. I was hoping for a splashdown, but I had more than enough TWR and fuel for a suicide burn We are home, with lander intact and Jeb alive and well! Level 3+++ completed!

That's two of my threads now that got into Honourable Mentions. I also didn't know that old threads could get into nominations for later months. Nevertheless, I appreciate everyone who nominated my challenge thread for this. Come check it out and take part yourself!

This SSTO with very creative name "PLEN GO UP" is gonna go to Minmus Landing was a bit sketchy, but nothing broke Gliding at hypersonic speeds until I reach KSC Approach and landing

Level 2+++ verified! Adding you to the leaderboard

After failing my Altitudinalist attempt, I decided to do the complete opposite of it and reach as low of a Kerbin orbit as I could. I present you... The Anti-Altitudinalist Flying to Orbit. The whole ascent went super smooth After circularizing I carefully adjusted my orbit with RCS thrusters and achieved orbit of 70000.2x70000.3 meters Deorbiting and reentering Flying towards the runway Smooth landing

First thing first: Level 1+ verified! Interesting utilization of inflatable airlocks. Will add you to the hall of fame I never used the newer versions of engines in this challenge (at least I don't think I did?). However, I did have issues with some engines not being able to burn off fuel tanks. Particularly the NERVA: it appears its exhaust is not as hot as in other engines? Even though AFAIK in real life NTR burn their fuel at higher temperatures, but I might be mistaken on that The workaround I found useful is to use a FL-A5 Adapter as sort of a decoupler between stages: it is thin enough to be burned off by NERVAs and Terriers and doesn't add too much mass to the total. I didn't test it with smaller engines like Ant or Spider though From what I know, you need KAL-1000 to properly assign engines to RCS controls, so you might need a workaround for this As this challenge is all about flexing Jeb's ego, he must do all the flying. Which means he will need to return to Kerbin to pilot the second launch if you want to assemble a ship in orbit However, the rules also state that you are allowed to bring other kerbals to your missions which you can use to your advantage. So, for example, if you build an Apollo-style ship you can leave Val in the Orbiter and pilot the Lander with Jeb, so when you return back to orbit you can tell Val to target the Lander's docking port, making docking easier Well, it's your lucky day! I have a topic from a fellow forum user just for you