BechMeister

Oh apologies.. I missunderstood. But i agree with you there. Totally...

You can grieve more than death.. you can grieve a break up with a significant other.. a friend turning radical.. a passion project failing despite giving it everything... Not to mention being disappointment with one self. I am going to share a moment in my life were I was disappointed in myself.. I once were as close to be unfaithful to my (at the time) girlfriend, as you can get, without being unfaithful. When I realized I had "lied" to myself... or constructed a narrative in my head, where what I was doing was okay.. and the whole card house collapsed. I looked into a mirror and saw a villain.. There were no redeeming quality, nothing. It is very tough to be placed face to face with fact that you are a "villain". The disappointment with myself took months to get through, because every time I saw my girlfriend get sad I was reminded of my failure... Fortunately my girlfriend forgave me, I learned a very important life lesson and now 7 years later we are happily married and have two lovely children. Why am I telling this story? Well.. Nate could probably be going through something similar.. Not living up to his promises, pushing the team harder than he had any right too (tbh work life balance mantra is also making a huge shift in the creative industry. Before it was the norm that you would be crunching.. now the industry tries to move away from that, and its being frowned upon.). Any way... he could be grieving many things, losing his passion project.. and not being the person he thought he was. To me its not ridiculous... its very plausible indeed that it could take this long to find the words.. especially when so many people hold him directly accountable for the failure. To him it was not "just a game" - it was 7 years of his life... work an toil.. it was his responsibility. To us its just "a game" - and plenty people here has shown signs of grieving its death too. Even if you may be above KSP2 failing.. One glance at the forum, reddit and youtube will show that plenty people has grieved the loss of the game. And experiencing the hatred.. vile comments from thousands of people. No person of a sound mind can brush that off without being affected. I dont know the man.. but apparently he was part of the KSP community before his job withing KSP2.. so technically he has also lost his community.. as half of it is busy putting him at the stakes.

I have experienced, sometimes.. if you put people who care deeply for a project in charge of the project.. they are the last to see that things aren't going their way.. some times they are "lying" to themselves.. other times they are just so focused on the task at hand that they simply don't sense the world around them. I feel like that type of people is a better second in command than the commander.

- Quick Update - Hello all - I just wanted to say that I am still playing this mission. However I had a setback.. my gaming laptop's charger port got a lose connection, and for some reason it took the repair shop 3 weeks to diagnostic the computer and give me an offer.. (even if they advertised it would take at 3-5 days) - then it took 2 weeks to get the parts... At the same time I am doing my Bachelor in Graphic Storytelling. (I'm doing a comic) Aaaaand Christmas is fast approaching as well.. On top of that I am a total masochist, and have decided to drive from Ares Base 01 to the site... which is going to take a while. Any way, rest assured that I am still going strong on this one. Here is a mood piece: The Duna Rover01 enroute to the Duna Monument.

Sorry if this post got a bit long.. But I had to put in writing what I feel about parts of the community's response to Nate... I just saw this from Shadow Zone film, then Matt Lowne. Then I saw the apology myself.. That was a tough watch.. I apricate his vulnerability - and message to the community, to the extend he can from NDA's I do agree that the management of this game has to be put under scrutiny... I do not agree with what I can only describe as a witch hunt on the man. Reading some of the comments in the comment sections on those two vids really give me a disgusting taste in my mouth. It's like people dont realize they are talking about a person.. and to an extend talking directly to Nate, which such vile hatred.. (a man they don't even know) Don't get me wrong.. I think Nate should be called out for all his lies about the code not being reused etc. It is also fair to question if he was the man to lead the project, since he (to my knowledge) is more of an artist than a coder.. I accept his apology though, and hope that he will get a chance to show that he has grown and learn... It seems to me that there are some people out there who will not be satisfied before he throws himself off a cliff.. and some who would even cheer upon that... I once lost a close friend of mine to suicide once.. In my teens I was depressed and suicidal.. I would and can never wish upon another human being.. to be broken to the point of self annihilation.. that got a bit dark.. sorry. Idk. We make mistakes.. Nate's was being blinded by his passion for the project.. his dream. I genuinely think he believed that they could turn the game around to the end. Like No Man's Sky, Cyberpunk etc. had been turned around... Sure from what i can read.. in hind sight he should have known he was at a folly with multiplayer etc. with the foundation taken from KSP1.. but tbh. I think Take Two is just as much to blame for the failure.. if not more.. when they denied them a chance to start from scratch after Intercept Games were handed the development of the game and forced them to use a code they did not write.. and not be able to ask the people who wrote it questions. Some people say he should never have taken the role as creative director... But I cant blame him for doing that.. If you were given your dream project and a chance to make it more than a remaster of KSP1.. would you not take it and fight for it..? People blame him for not seeing the obvious.. that the ship was sinking rapidly.. but to that I say - any one who has been under accumulated stress knows that you do not stop up to ponder upon the saber tiger when its chasing you.. No you run, fight or play dead.. And you may be thinking "what do I mean with that?" Well maybe my background as a soldier has given me an unique insight to what stress do to you. idk I was taught what happens to you when you are in an environment of stress. You do not have the ability to stop up, zoom out and consider the facts. Our brain is not wired like that.. Now.. today the saber tiger has just been replaced with taxes, insurances, getting the kids to school, doing your job... or in Nate's case, game development... and fighting is no longer done with a flint knife but project management, time management etc. And you'll never outrun that... So unless you are trained to do so..(and even if you are its hard) you won't stop up, zoom out and consider the facts... you just "run". I cannot blame the man for having a dream about what KSP2 could be - we all wanted that dream... we were all excited about that dream when we saw the reveal trailer.. Any way - TL;DR I don't know what more the man can do than to apologize.. nothing else is within his power. I will for all time criticize how he managed to project.. But tbh.. I think he does so himself too - that is the vibe I got from his video.. However I will forgive him as a person. He lost it all. His "baby" (the game) - to an extend his community (either through shame of interacting with us.. or the witch hunters wanting nothing more than to see him fall) and maybe even his career.. I hope this is not the last we see to him in game development. That he gets a chance to show that he has learned from his mistakes... I have to. Because I believe in second chances and growth as a person.

oh wow.. is that a mod? I've never had fog in the game before

-= R&D_Update =- Challenge 7 - Making The Duna Plane. The Duna Plane - DAP and its 1st stage enroute to space! So - I have spend some time looking into making a new Duna plane - after the discovery that the plane I had sent to Duna was no longer air worthy. It was interesting designing a increasingly lighter airframe with better stall speeds. For a long while I just kept improving the already existing airframe - But in the end I figured it was maybe an Idea to try make a dual engine design (just so I could get more Δv for actual flight.) In the end it I remembered that by the time the plane would get to Duna, that the Ares Mission 1 crew would be home - So I might as well build an autonomous drone for flying around on Duna. In the spoiler section bellow you'll find the development of the planes that were not chosen to be send to Duna. Development "dead ends": The new Duna Areal Probe (DAP): Stats: Weight Empty:....................:14,16t Weight Fueled:...................:15,22t Fuel Ammount: - Hydrogen:......................:03,75t - Monopropellant:................:00,80t Δv Count on Duna:................:2034 Power Source:....................:KR4-P3 The plane is pretty cumbersome - It looks like something that should be super fast.. and it was not easy to get the plane balanced - a lot of weight was added to the nose via. the reactor and a few science modules to give it weight in the nose.. I always find it difficult to make probes balanced.. since the nose cones are so light - I know the game is dead.. but if we had a mass slider to the nose cones.. it would have been awesome. I usually just stuff it with batteries and monopropellant. Take off: Stall speed: Turn Performance: On KSC its only really possible to do rudder turns - pitch up and turn with the rudder and trade in the gained altitude for regained speed. That being said.. a turn should only really be performed with at least ~40-50 m/s - or the plane will not have enough airspeed to recover.. and the result will be this: Developing a 1st stage: Ever since as a kid, playing Ace Combat 3 - Electrosphere - I always liked the design of the Neocom R-352 and or the Orion 3 (with its 1st stage) from 2001: A Space Odyssey: The Neucom R-302 Orbiter and 1st stage. Concept of Orion3 with its 1st stage. I wanted to do something similar - make an space plane, with a space plane 1st stage that can land itself again. It was challenging - as the game is really lacking sleek space planes parts in the sizes needed for making a propper 1st stage. My first attempt looked like this: first flight test of the DAP 1st stage. v.1.0 This is the first iteration of the 1st stage. The two Skipper engines gave the vehicle ~3000 Δv - I expected it would be halved once it was married to the DAP - however another issue presented itself. The two skipper engines could not lift the vehicle from the ground at all. I could put on bigger engines - but the weight was an issue.. if the rear got much heavier it would not be able to reenter stable. I ended up adding a LV-t45 swivel and two MK-55 Thuds: 1st stage v.3.0 The vehicle now had enough thrust to hover above the pad - I tried to add bigger engines, but it was impossible to balance the vehicle to not reenter with its rear first. I ended up adding 4 small "thumper" solid rocket motors to the stack. It meant the rocket had enough thrust to weight ratio to get off the ground - and the entire 1st stage with solid rocket motors were able to get the DAP (very gentle) up to 53km, before stage separation, with a AP at 90km and a gentle slope. As you can see the rocket only endured 2.9g on the entire ascent The 1st stage would then have to land on the other side of Kerbin - man I wish the game could have been developed to the point were we would have gotten multiple launch places... a runway and landing pads on the other side of the planet would have been so cool. After all the balancing, building and engineering had been done. It was time to certify the rocket and send it into orbit - first stop K.G.02 for a refuel before going to Duna in the next Duna Kerman transfer window. Challenge 7 - Here I come! The DAP docked to K.G.02 - refueled and ready to launch for Duna. The only thing left to do is the launch the DAP to K.G.02. Were it will dock, refuel and be on standby for the next Kerbin-Duna transfer window. The vehicle has enough fuel to get to Duna - where it will land and refuel at Ares Base 01 - for the Duna flight. See the spoiler section bellow for a detailed look at the launch of the vehicle. Moving Forward: Next update will be with the Ares Crew going to the Duna Monument. I saw on a map that I am relatively close bye. Stay tuned for more!

MISSAN_UPDATE: - Two step forward, One back - Duna Expedition Team at Ares Base 01 Flagpole Foreword: My dear readers! This is going to be a long one. Before talking about the triumphs and tragedies of this mission update. I would like to touch upon my two space stations K.G.01 and 02 - I build those back in the day to help me getting to the other bodies inside the Kerbol system. I hated getting things into orbit because of the wobbly rockets - and decided to build the stations so bigger crafts did not need to wobble through the atmosphere, but could launch from outside it. Where as the game ended before I could fully exploit them... This mission update really proved the concept right! And even though its sad that this will be the last KSP2 blog I'll write.. (probably) It sure is nice that it brings all my projects together for one final Huzzah!. Because I was genuinely enthusiastic about this one... the update has become very long. I apologize in advance and thank you, my reader, sticking to the end and indulging me. Enjoy! Lessons Learned; Lessons Identified: A. Get the ICV Hermes to Duna Low Orbit - Success B. Get the Duna Jet to Duna Low Orbit - Success C. Land the Duna Expedition Team in Claws of War valley - Success D. Land the Duna Jet + Asset in Claws of War valley - Failure Mission Tasks: A: The Duna Transfer: ICV Hermes enroute to Duna from K.G.02 The Δv Budget for the Duna Transfer and Capture: The ICV Hermes had a lot of first for me. It was the first vehicle were I would attempt an Aerobrake and It was the first Intercelestial Vehicle to set out from Kerbin Gate 02 - orbiting The Mun. I was really excited to see what starting the journey to other planets from The Mun would do to the Δv budget.. and let me tell you.. I did not expect it to save me that much Δv. Together with the Aerobraking it really made the journey cheap. Δv cost pr. maneuver: Escape Mun and Kerbin SOI:..................................17Δv Duna Transfer Trajectory Adjustments:......................511Δv Duna Aerobrake Trajectory Adjustments:......................22Δv Duna Circularization Burn:..................................42Δv* Total:.....................................................592Δv * Δv reading is after heatshield probe has been ditched See transfer maneuvers in spoiler section bellow: The Journey from Kerbin to Duna: Crew performing the reconfiguration of the HAB module for centrifugal gravity. After the course had been charted to Duna, the craft had done its acceleration it was time to re-configure it for Cruise Mode and prepare for it to rotate to artificially generate gravity. In my head cannon, the HAB module are build to be as light as possible, and there for needs to be under tensile stress. It also fits with the seating position, since it will allow for the crew to be exposed to positive G's only. - Once reconfigured it was just about rotating the craft until it showed 1G for the crew. It looks a bit goofy perhaps - and I worry that this design would actually behave like this handle on the ISS - since the center of rotation is not at the center of mass. like this: I imagine the vehicle wanting to flip like this would causing a lot of stress through the megastructure of the vehicle. Since the SAS would need to counter the urge to change axis. Perhaps some one more knowledgeable in this can enlighten me... if this would be an issue? An way - It was the only feasible way for me to generate gravity, to keep the Kerbals healthy on the 272 day travel to Duna. I wish we had gotten the gravity ring module they were teasing.. But I guess there were a lot of wishes that were not fulfilled.. Aerobrake Maneuver: The Duna Expedition Team preparing the ICV Hermes for the Aerobreak maneuver - notice the heatshields probe parked in front of the vehicle to allow the DAVs to move into position. once the ship had been reconfigured for the maneuver. The crew safely strapped into the DAVs (Duna Ascent Vehicles) - in case the maneuver would cause a rapid unscheduled disassembly - and the heatshield was deployed. See spoiler section for preparation for Aerobrake: After the ICV Hermes had completed the aerobrake maneuver - this was the message received from the ships crew. "Once ready, I set our lowest approach to Duna, through the atmosphere, to a solid 24km - for some aggressive aerobraking... Go hard or go home I always say! I anticipated that I had to go low if I wanted an effect of the thin atmosphere - I was coming in fast after all. I was worried though.. I had read that the deployable heat shield create a significant amount of drag... So full SAS and RCS control was handled over to the ships main computer to keep the ship straight. And then it was just following the prograde through, while keeping a hand ready to pull the detach handle for the DAV in case Hermes wouldn't make it!" - Jebediah Kerman - Duna Expedition Leader. See video below for full aerobrake maneuver - complete with the awesome Duna Reentry OST. As you can see the vehicle performed admirable! One thing though... I was a little worried about the H² tank being graced by the plasma stream. I think it is an interesting design choice to make the biggest heat shield the diameter of the biggest fuel tank. With how the plasma plume will bend inwards I assume it will always be an issue? Maybe if you attach it directly to the fuel tank it wont.. but then you'll realistically only be able to use one... I think an more sensible solution would have it be slightly bigger than the diameter of the tank I did "paint" the fuel tank black - so let's just pretend it's coated in heat tiles. Boiling H² does not sound like something I recommend The result of the aggressive aerobrake was this capture: Only thing left were slight adjustments to the orbit - costing a total of 42Δv to circularize the orbit around a pe70km - ap70km orbit and call it Objective Complete! B - "KSC... We have a problem" The Duna Jet performing its Duna Transfer burn from LKO. The Duna Jet set out to its journey towards Duna with no issues. The issues would however arrive at Duna. While the ship had plenty of Δv to get to Duna... I did not have a lot of Δv to actually perform the capture burn. The ship spend all but 58Δv capturing Duna - had i been less sloppy with were I entered the Duna SOI it may have been different.. but I was too focused on the ICV Hermes maneuver.. the Duna Jet became more of a secondary task for me. the result was this: The Duna Jet elliptical orbit after Duna Capture But! with how succesful ICV - Hermes Aerobrake was, I decided to solve my Δv problem the same way. I lowered the AP by performing careful aerobrakes. I figured that If I went through the atmosphere with the Cruise Stage engine first - they would be able to take the heat and shield the main fuselage of the plane, as well as the atomic engine and the reentry engines of the capsule. - also with the planes wings creating drag.. it would probably be the most stable way to go. The Duna Jet performing aerobrake on the upper atmosphere - 43km of altitude. Where ICV Hermes did an aggressive PE 25km aerobrake - the Duna Jet would initially just grace the atmosphere at 43km. Here is a diagram showing the lowering of the AP: Notice that I had to burn prograde in the last pass to not go suborbital. The circularization maneuver went perfect - and the last thing to do was to ditch the main engine - and raise the PE: See spoiler section for more images of the leg: C. Boots on the ground! ICV - Hermes above Duna after the heatshield has been ditched. Now the easy part had been completed - now it was going to be easy... except it was here the game seriously bugged out. I don't know what it is.. but I think the June 11 patch brought with it some really annoying bugs. I have never before had any issues with landing gears, grid fins or solar panels being blocked by nothing... or parachutes that would only be deployed if set to "immediately" - I guess Kerbol must have had some crazy solar activity.. for the DAVs were riddled broken systems. I also had made a slight oversight with the DAV designs - the Δv available for deorbiting and landing was to low... Thus I had to perform deorbit burns with ICV Hermes, and then boost it into orbit again after releasing the DAVs. - luckily I had plenty of Δv available for unforeseen issues like these. See spoiler section for de-orbit and re-orbit maneuvers: The two DAVs successfully landed in the Claws of War valley - with all their "broken" pieces. The two DAVs successfully touched down in the Claws of War Valley. - luckily the 4 engines sticking out the heatshield can be substituted for landinglegs AND they landed on leveled ground. Status after touch down: DAV01 had 1/2 solar panels that worked... DAV02 had none as well as an ladder that would not extend. I think the Kerbals can reach the capsule if they stand on top of a Duna Rover... I made sure to turn off all systems on DAV02, and just hope the batteries will last until the crew has to rendezvous with ICV Hermes - otherwise we have a rescue mission at hand. The crew of DAV02 entering the Duna Rover01 After combating all the problems It was just a matter of carefully driving the crew back - The bug where bases and vehicles gets propelled when they load in is still present... (Percy was decentigrated by the bug) But by driving no faster than 10m/s I can quickly load into the DAVs and make sure they dont tumble over when they get loaded in. Luckily the base element and DAVs landed real close to each other - otherwise 10m/s would have been a pain... the distance between DAV01 and 02 (default name-26 and 25) to Duna Base 01 For slide show of the entire mission leg, see spoiler section bellow: D: Two steps forward - One step back: The Duna Jet on its way down - shortly before disaster would strike. While the game had thrown bugs at me, and I had done a few design blunters - it was nothing compared to the issues the the Duna Jet would give me... I had so many issues launching the thing - first it bugged in a way where it would be total vehicle loss once i used the decouplers. - I solved that by deleting the vehicle in orbit above Duna, loading a new one at KSC and using the cheat tool to get it into orbit again. (being carefull to match the orbit) That made me successfully land the fuel tank for the plane... But then the solar panels would be blocked... I reloaded a safe.. and made sure the solar panels were extended in the VAB before cheating the vehicle back to LDO.. and successfully landed the fuel tank. Then it was the planes turn... and it would not deploy the grid fins regularly. they kept going from being deployed to not be deployed from quickload to quickload.. Some times they would actuate.. some times they wouldn't... I tried and tried to land the craft but in the end it didn't matter.. the for the plane was flawed... I could not understand what was going on - so I put a copy of the plane on to the runway at KSC and launched it - and do you know what? It could not fly! I dont know whats going on.. It worked last I tested it. I dont remember if I build the plane before or after the June 11 patch though..? Never the less. a double challenge completion is no longer possible - and I now have to design a new Duna Plane. Who knows.. maybe it will save the Expedition if(or knowing my luck - when) I find out the DAVs tumble or run out of battery. For detailed walkthrough of the mission leg, see spoiler section bellow: It ends with a bang. Moving Forward: Next update will be the return tour of the Duna Expedition - provided nothing goes wrong - and a completion of challenge 7! Stay Tuned in for More!

MISSION_UDATE: The ICV Hermes (Cruise Stage) docked at K.G.02 - ready for assembly. Foreword: So I got the next step done, I had the ICV Hermes docked with K.G.02 - and the game did not crash like the last time I tried to dock an ICV to K.G.02 I flew the crew from KSC to K.G.02 - it became bit of a "victory lap" for the Kerbin Gate systems. Since I was able to use first the crew rotation plane, and the Mun to Low Kerbin Orbit (MLKO's) and this will be the first and last time I get a mission to and back from another celestial body. Any way without further ado - here is the task list: Mission Tasks: A. Get the Duna Expedition Crew from KSC to K.G.01 - Success B. Get the Duna Expedition Crew from K.G.01 to K.G.02 - Success C. Assemble the ICV Hermes and prepare for the Manned Duna Mission - Success Lessons Learned; Lessons Identified: A. Single ticket to Kerbin Gate 01: The Crew SSTO space plane docking with K.G.01 to transfer the Duna Expedition Crew. This step succeeded - mostly. The few iterations I've made to the space plane over the time - adding reaction control wheels, more batteries etc. has meant that the Δv margin has become a little too small, and I spend a little too much Δv getting it into orbit - fortunately K.G.01 has plenty of Methalox, So I could refuel the ~300Δv required for an easy deorbit. If this mission wasn't the last thing I'll do in KSP2 I would probably go tweak the plane. But as of now its good enough. The Duna Expedition Crew was successfully transfered to K.G.01 - At K.G.02 they will meet legendary expedition leader Jebidiah Kerbin - and proceed to Duna. For detailed mission walkthrough see spoiler section bellow: B. Getting the crew to the ICV. The M.L.K.O. docking with the H.T.D. The next step was pretty routine - the MLKO's and H.T.D. (Heavy Tug Drone) are well tested. The step went without incident, and a detailed runthrough of the mission leg can be found in the spoiler section bellow: C. Preparation for the Duna Expedition. ICV - Hermes ready for launch of K.G.02 and to a Duna Intercept Course. Finally, we came to the assembly of the ship that will bring the crew to Ares Base 01. After transfering crew, refueling the entire ship with monopropellant and methalox. It was time to undock the crew module and connect it with the cruise stage. See spoiler section for ship assembly: Since the HAB module had to be docked in the "centrifugal gravity configuration", where all the crew seatings are positioned so the G-force from acceleration will be applied sideways rather than horizontal as positive G's - I had to fold the arms down to "acceleration gravity configuration" : - See image below for clarification: Left: Notice the HAB areas are configured in the centrifugal gravity configuration. Right: Notice the arms are being positioned for the acceleration gravity configuration. The ship is now ready for the further mission - the final Δv count is 7.460. Moving Forward: Next step is getting the Duna Expedition 01 to Ares Base 01 - as well as the Duna Jet. Stay tuned for that!

MISSION_RESUMED: - Prepping for challenge 7 and 8 - ISV Cruise Stage, slowing down to be captured by The Mun Foreword: Alright - Now that I've had a good long vacation from the Game, I had finally recuperated the energy needed to grind through the assembly of the crew module and refueling of the cruise stage for the Duna Plane. Of course with plenty of bugs to spare. The folder with images was getting pretty big.. So I thought it was time to make an update. Mission Tasks: A. Assemble the crew module and dock it to K.G.02 - Success B. Refuel the cruise stage of the Duna Plane. - Success C. Perform Capture Burn on the ICV cruise stage around The Mun. - Success Lessons Learned; Lessons Identified: A. Assembling the pieces: The crew section docking with K.G.02 - awaiting crew and the cruise stage arrival. The assembly of the crew module was a bit finicky. Not only was my pc running at 5-15 fps but when designing the individual pieces I forgot to give each piece its own balanced RCS thrusters. It meant some of the pieces were near impossible to adjust... But through a few evenings watching crime shows with my wife while RCS thrusting every once and a while, I managed to assemble the pieces and dock it to K.G.02 - now awaiting the crew to arrive. Before sending the crew, I had to deorbit the transfer stages and splash them down on Kerbin. The transfer stages has left The Mun SOI and are enroute to Kerbin - notice the Cruise Stage has entered Kerbin SOI. (right side) De-orbiting the stages would proof if the aerobreaks would stabilize the vehicle enough to fly heatshield down through the atmosphere. A feat the grid fins had proved unable to. Luckily it worked. With the aerobreaks deployed at 45° angle - the vehicle could maintain heatshield forward with a maximum deviation of 20° from prograde as seen here: I was also lucky that the timing and spacing of all 5 transfer stages allowed me to land each of them without despawning any. I was prepared to do the quick save scam to land each piece. The result was 5 successfully landed stages: For a detailed walkthrough of a stage de-orbit: see spoiler section bellow: B. Refueling the Duna Plane: The H.T.V. docked to the Duna Plane refueling its transfer stage with Methalox. The refueling of the Duna Planes transfer stage went easily enough, albeit not without incidents. The refueling part went really smooth - I do know the characteristics of the H.T.V. a lot by now. It only took 3 launches to get it fueled up. H.T.V. performing deorbit burn to land at KSC. However, even though the refueling of the plane went smoothly. Landing the H.T.V. on the pad was obstructed by bugs. For some reason the landing legs and aerobreaks would bug out after a few loadings and reloadings. And since landing the 1st stage would always demand a load… or the disappearance of the orbit lines would demand a reboot of the game. The vehicle would “break” throughout the procedures. At least I tested a few times if I could deploy the landing legs, after I encountered the bug the first time.. H.T.V. reentering Kerbins Atmosphere. Ofcourse I could just skip the landing of the 1st stage.. but I really enjoy doing that. Or I could push it to after the maneuver.. but that seemed like a lot of back and forth loading. Its annoying because the landing would have been perfect! as seen here: But the legs did not deploy, and the fact that the docking port is sticking out a bit, caused the vehicle to fall over on the pad. Maybe I’ll go about fixing the landing legs.. idk. I dont know if I will be playing KSP2 after this mission is done. Long story short - the Duna Plane was refueled and is now ready to blast off to Duna at the next Kerman Duna transfer window. See spoiler section for a complete rundown of a refueling mission - here the 3rd and last: C. Catching The Mun: The ICV cruise stage enroute to K.G.02 This went without incident. After a few expensive course corrections the stage was within the Muns SOI and had found a trajectory that would rendezvous with K.G.02 as seen on the screenshot above. Soon it will be at K.G.02, where it will refuel and fit the crew stage and it is ready to fly its crew to Duna. Moving Forward: Now the most tedious tasks are done. Ahead of me is the following tasks: Get the crew from KSC to K.G.01 Transfer the crew from K.G.01 to K.G.02 Refuel the ICV Cruise Stage and dock it with the Crew Stage. Fly the ICV Hermes and the Duna Plane to Duna. Stay tuned for the next update until those tasks has been completed. If people are interested I can also cover the Duna Plane in detail, if not.. It will be a surprise what's under the farings on the transfer module once it's re-entered Duna's atmosphere and it can be shed. Until then, Stay tuned for the long awaited ending.

damn... thats rough... I did 1/3 or maybe it was really only 1/4th on Minmus.. and that demanded continuos dedication and effort.. especially because the low gravity on the body, and the janky rover mechanics.. you tend to spend more time driving straight and being in the air than actually driving Any way.. I have made respect for people doing these challenges.

Uh! it looks great! Are you planning on adding more?

I mean I build my station with a unmodded KSP2. So it should be possible - but I did only have like ~10 fps in KSP2 near my station. I figured KSP1 would be better since I thought it was better optimized?

Nice! getting them into the correct orbit can be quite an hassle... When I made my station in KSP2 I put little engines on the structure to allow it to do orbital maneuvers.. Took quite a few runs to get it into a "perfect" orbit - I went with a ca. 100km ca. 100km - having the station orbit a pretty precise orbit made it easier to dock with it. My method of docking is setting up a orbit that is 10km bellow the orbit of the target. Once it is right under it I just burn prograde and they will intercept. It would usually just be 10 dv to get the rendezvous set up. And because the craft is only 10km under the target orbit - its only like 20 m/s you need to cancel out x) If you want I can show you more how I do it.. but I'll be doing it in KSP2 (it should translate well enough though) Yeah.. it can be hard to get a vehicle that is flexible enough. Did you fly it into space in one go? Because I shipped mine in pieces and assembled it in space with little tug drones Any way. Well done - I am looking forward to see the rest of the progress

Nice! well done x) what orbit is it in? Have you developed the service vehicles your going to use to refuel the station? and a crew rotation vehicle? Also.. can you tell us a little about the building process?

Mission: 1. Establish Gas Station in Low Kerbin Orbit + support vehicles: Establish a Gas Station in Low Kerbin Orbit capable of containing 160t fuel Build a launch platform that can refuel the gas station. - Bonus point if the vehicle is reusable. Build a spaceplane for crew rotation. 2. Establish COMM Network around Duna: Establish a 3 probe communication Network around Duna that's capable of reaching Kerbin. Bonus points if you establishes a Molniya or Polar orbit Constellation. Establish a Min. 6 probe Communication Network around Duna that is capable of reatching the 3 long range probes and can relay information to Duna. 3. Send lander probe to scout for suitable base locations: Create a Lander that can take a surface sample in the polar regions of Duna. Send as many probes as needed to find a suitable location for a base 4. Send a Rover to make a thorough survey of the landing site: Build a rover, and a lander capable of receiving and sending samples back home to Kerbin for study. 5. Create a Interplanetary Vehicle for Kerbin - Duna round trips: Build a vacuum optimized vehicle, capable of automatic flight - that can do a Duna - Kerbin round trip and carrying 50t payload. Should use the Gas Station for refueling. 6. Create base elements for a crew of 6 Kerbals: Create a Base containing of at least: 1x Lab 1x CHU (Container Housing Unit) with room for at least 6 Kerbal 1x Power unit with enough solar power to run the base. 2x Rovers with room for at least 3 Kerbals. 1-2x Duna Ascent Vehicles - for rendezvous with the Interplanetary Vehicle. 7. Develop a cruise stage for traveling from Kerbin to Duna and Back. Develop a cruise stage that can house the 6 Kerbals on their ~200 day tour and ~200 day retour from Duna. Must Contain: Artificial gravity in form of rotation. Landing vehicles for the Duna Base Send 6 Kerbals to the Duna Base and complete a manned mission to and back from Duna. This is just a collection of things I was doing in KSP2 before my drive died out with the cancelation of KSP2... the numbers are random x)

Sure.. but fx my alliance in eve ditched their forum and uses discords archive function. Its just not the same though.. Thats odd i heard people say that the only thing you could not fix on ksp1 is the UI Yeah i know... this might sound a bit weird.. but i think the fact that KSP2 launched feature barren was what allowed me to get into it. I have tried KSP1 earlier... but I was a bit overwhelmed by all the options and pathways you can take. But I think im good enough in KSP2 now that KSP1 would not be an issue.

I am late to the show i see - already 5 tabs gee... Any way.. When I bought KSP2 and joined the forum to bug report I was blown away by seeing a 2010 style forum, healthy and thriving.. it makes me a bit sad that feels like its been dying together with KSP2.. i really liked it here. But maybe its only KSP 2 segment that is dying.. is the KSP1 segment alive? Ive been considering getting KSP1... but I just really dont like the HUD and I prefered the KSP2 looks of the Kerbals.. any way im going off a tangent. All i wanted to say was that i really liked the KSP community and i would be sad to see it go.

Looking forward to see what you came up with!

Oh wow... It is actually really nice to know that some one nominated me - I dont think its a secret that it takes a while to write every update to the report. So thank you for the recognition Now I have to finish the challenge after my break.

MISSION ON HALT - Postponed indefinitely - Foreword: I have decided to post what I have done of progress on the challenges and postpone the mission... I have gotten a severe burnout from the game. As you can see I have acquired quite a few hours in the game - and I can feel with the absence of the community I just dont feel the same drive to press on through bad frame rates and bugs. I am going to do a short write up of what has happened since the last post. And then we will have to see when I get back to it. Challenge 7 progression: First step was to get the ICV Cruise Stage back to Kerbin. The ICV was actually the first to leave Duna SOI - with the DSRV following shortly. Due to small variation in trajectory, the DSP actually managed to return to Kerbin first - and as of now - the ICV is still enroute to Kerbin approx 2-3 days from Kerbin SOI. The maneuver that brings the ICV back to Kerbin. As you can see the vehicle has spend a little more than half its hydrogen load - since The Base Stack is heavier than The Crew Module - I think it will have enough fuel to complete challenge 7 (brining kerbals to Duna and back.) Getting the Crew assembly to orbit: The Crew Module together with the two DAV vehicles were launched in 5 launchers. I reused the 2nd stage that sent the Duna Rover and Duna Sample Retriever capsules to Duna. For launch a petit four of the launches see spoiler section bellow: It launched the 5 parts to K.G.02 for link up with the ICV. Hoping to have the module assembled by the time the ICV enters Kerbin SOI. for detailed maneuver walkthrough, see spoiler section bellow: Arriving at K.G.02 2nd vehicle arriving at K.G.02 - an crew arm for the HAB module with artificial gravity. Notice one of the DAVs in the bottom left. The modules actually arrived in very short succession - some getting there with less than 30 ingame minutes in between. I would park them all around K.G.02 (the space station) - and prepare for assembly. The middle section was the last module to arrive at K.G.02 It was here I found out I didn't have RCS thrusters enough around the different modules, and the ones that had were poorly placed around their center of mass - meaning that assembly became rather tedious. I also had K.G.02 blow half up while assembling the module.. but I only found that out several steps ahead. The setback was what became the final nail in the coffin. I was almost done with the pain of assembling the crew module in sub 10 fps when I forgot to keep track of the Krakken. Challenge 8 Progression: The Duna plane attached to a pod containing a mobile fuel tank - to refuel the plane on the planet. I successfully designed a plane that could take of from Runway 01 using the atomic engines. It had a stall speed of somewere between 30 and 40 m/s - which I learned from Herbal the space program is good margins for Duna Flight. The plane was designed during the night (since there was only 3-4 days until the ICV would enter Kerbins SOI - the engineers on KSC were working full speed to maximise the time.) This means that I dont really have pictures of the building process. I think i managed to design a plane that looked good while being able to get some flying done. But the plane has a limited Δv pool - so I am sending it to Duna with a fuel tank that has fuel for a few flights. I put it all in a pod and send it to orbit. How ever I made a small mistake when designing the pod. It had 2500 Δv - which I thought would be more than enough.. but I forgot that my 1st Stage only uses 1500 Δv - the rest is for boost back and landing. So the vehicle only had 500 Δv once in orbit. Because the plane has so much drag I did not want to go through launching it again.. It was really difficult to get it to perform the gravitiy turn without flipping. So I made a slight redesign of my Heavy Tanker Vehicle - from the K.G.01 service vehicle pack. I gave it the micro port and now I can refuel the rocket and get it to Duna.For slide show of the launch of the HTV - see spoiler section bellow: What is the current situation? That means that right now the following is in motion: The ICV Hermes Cruise Stage is enroute to Kerbin The ICV Hermes Crew Module is being assembled at K.G.02 The Challenge 8 Duna Plane is in LKO awaiting refueling. The HTV is in LKO waiting for a rendezvous with Challenge 8 Duna Plane. Moving forward: I dont know when I'll come back and finish this.. only time will tell. Thanks for reading so far.

Albeit a very short time - it was 2003. But i have always heard that Tesla did not do very well until Musk came into the picture. I can only go from what I've heard people say.. i was not there.

I can see them believing that.. I mean we cant deny that Tesla pre Elon was not that competitive.. so in a sense he did do something.

This is like the path of any dictator too - right before the fall.. they "fire" all who challenge them.. and then when then they are are surrounded by "yes-men" they think they can invade the 2nd largest European nation and take it in 2 weeks.. but end up screwing the nations economy and get interlocked in a 3+ year war of attrition... I have always wondered about Musk.. how much he seems to do. Because depinding on who you listen to he is more of an annoyance to the development of the company. Others say that he has some knowlegde about programing and engineering makes him able to make discisions on the spot.. thus propelling the project faster than any economist could ever do. But then.. i heard the only reason the falcon heavy was not cancled because "starship would be ready within a year" was some one at the board having the balls to say "no Elon.. people have already paid for flights on the damn thing" Idk. I have been more and more ambivilent about Space X and Musk. Is he a quicky aspergers who say dumb excrements and gets missunderstood? Or is he as cold and detached from real life as some claims.. I can try come with an example.. as a scandinavian his views on unions are deeply flawed. But when he says "If we need unions we have failed as a company" i guess you can see that as blind naivity. Like he believes that he can control weather his employees are being treated well. Even though there is multiple people between him and his workers.. and he cant guarentee they will treat them well. Which is what the unions and agreements are for. Is he just naive here? Or is he cold and calculated and see humans more as a resource than people... Sorry.. bit of a tangent. But it is interesting to see how he has gone from the best thing since sliced bread back in 2011.. to now. Didnt the Norwegian Oil Fund block this raise again?

-=Duna Sample Return Mission=- Part 2: Bring it Home! The Sample Pod being launched into a LDO. <<<<<FOREWORD>>>>> Have I got an update for you. I finally got challenge 6 in the bag! But it was not easy, and before the end another mission killing thriller would present itself. I dont know if you, my dear reader, remember when I wrote this: But as you can see, even though I've been looking at the Δv map a hundred times by now.. I failed to see that 1433 Δv is 12Δv shy of what is needed to get into a 60km Low Duna Orbit. I had my work cut out for me, and was really working the problem. Right as I was about to throw the towel in the ring and go redesign the Lander with the Sample Ascent Stage, send it to Duna at the next Kermann Transfer Window... and extend the mission once more... I found a solution.. The most Kerbal of solutions. More on that bellow! <<<<<MISSION_TASKS>>>>> A. Launching the Duna Sample Return Vehicle v2(DSRV) to Duna - Success B. Launch the Duna Sample Pod(DSP) and dock with the DSRV - Success C. Burn the DSP into a Kerbin transfer trajectory - Success <<<<<Lessons Learned; Lessons Identified>>>>> A: Launching the DSRV into LKO: The SDG ready on the pad - a beautiful morning at KSC. The redesign of the DSRV allowed it to be launched with the SDG - giving the glider one last mission before the end. The DSRV only weighing ~2t meant that the SDG had no issues getting the vehicle into LKO. The launch went without incidents.. or at least almost - the glider had a hard landing and toppled... Only taking minor damage - For details see spoiler section bellow: The DSRV performing one of its many burns to escape Kerbin. With the DSRV successfully launched into a ~80km LKO orbit. It was time to answer the interesting question of "how many passes around Kerbin will it take to reach escape velocity?" It turned out to be quite a lot - 25 to be exact.. and I was even lucky that the 25th pass took me into The Muns SOI - thus providing me with a hefty gravity assist. Unfortunately for me a bug showed up. Which meant that if I burned while in time warp, the AP would not be raised... So I had to do 25 burns averaging at 6 ingame minutes in real time... and due to my performance, every ingame second is taking 4 seconds. (I am never making a Ion driven craft again) Luckily I could put on a good podcast and get it done while doing the dishes. After every burn. I recorded the raising of AP to just get a sense of how long it would take. I did the same for when I arrived at Duna, but in reverse - you can see the data below: The DSRV was set to arrive at Duna on its second crossing of Duna's Orbit. Once outside Kerbin's SOI adjustments were made to the trajectory - picking a high intercept trajectory of ~ 26.842km as seen bellow: Notice that the Duna capture burn took 1h 15min - because of the time warp bug I could not do this while in time warp... and I counted out every ingame second to be 4 sek. So I set a timer to 3h 30min and went with my kids to the playground. When I arrived home 4h later I had a PE of 60.210m - Perfect timing for circulating the orbit in a LDO. See spoiler section for the maneuver nodes: The DSRV was now ready in an orbit that would pass over the Claws of War Valley twice a day - and it was just a matter of launching the Duna Sample Pod(DSP) B: "KSC! We have a problem!": Left: Percy - the Duna Rover01 - handing over the soil samples to the Duna Sample Pod (The Probe Core) Right: The DSP being launched. As stated in the foreword... I had designed myself into a corner with this one. For two evenings I tried to find the most efficient way to get out of the atmosphere with the 1st stage. So the much weaker 2nd stage did not waste Δv holding velocity. Work the problem: Evaluating the different attempts could be divided into these 3 attempt categories: Attempt 1: Burn at 100% thrust Stage separate realize Stage 2 is to weak to fight drag failing to reach orbit. Attempt one was pretty straight forward - it was before I had realized that I had screwed up the Δv requirements for getting into a Low Duna Orbit. I would burn the 1st stage 100% thrust and run out of fuel before I had gotten significantly out of the atmosphere. The rocket would get an AP of ~40-50km. But as soon as the thrust died the AP dropped drastically - lets face it.. the blunt face of the ascent stage is not really low drag... However thin the duna atmosphere is. It resulted in the 2nd stage wasting much of its Δv just maintaining velocity, and slowly climbing out to were it was more efficient.. and in the end the rocket could not escape the atmosphere. Attempt 2: Burn at 25% thrust Stage separate much higher in the atmosphere Be able to cross the Duna Kerman Line. I remembered reading about ideal TWR - and manipulating the thrust handle, as to not overburn and waste Δv on fighting drag. I decided to sip the Δv on stage 1 like wine, instead of taking it like a shot, and try to extend the 1st stages burn time through the atmosphere so stage separation would happen in the thinner parts. There is no reason to have an AP of 50km when your only 3-4km off the ground. It helped the rocket get into space - but it would still not get into orbit. Attempt 2.5: not shown in the graph as its similar to attempt 3 but flown SW instead of E. Now - as you can see Attempt 1 and 2 always started with a right hand turn - this was to match the orbit of the DSRV which was actually more close to south west than south - as shown. Meaning that the ascent stage had to actually fly directly into a polar orbit... and slightly against the planets rotation - The lander module still had Δv left, and I figured I could turn the launch vehicle so it faced in the direction of the rendezvous vector. (before it was facing 90­° east). I turned the lander and launched the rocket. Because there were less Δv spend on turning the rocket actually reached a PE of 12km - not enough, but we were getting close to going into orbit. Attempt 3: Launch due east at 25% thrust Stage separate and cross the Kerman Line. Almost reach Orbit. I went on a mad hunt on the internet for the most efficient ascent profile.. I found an old reddit post that mentioned that getting into a polar orbit required significantly more Δv than just going due east from the equator. (I really started to regret my polar adventure) It was something about being able to add the rotational velocity of the planet? - If some one can verify the information I would be grateful. On Kerbin that is something like 200 m/s - not much but every bit counts. However.. going into orbital mode on Duna showed that, from where I was launching, it was only rotating with 20m/s... I tried to launch the rocket due east - which I figured would be the best option in relation to Coriolis effect etc? I may be wrong though.. there is no winning launching from a polar orbit it seems. Still I managed to raise my orbit to a PE of 17km - So very close to orbit! (it's still quite a few km off sure - but you dont need a lot of Δv to move the PE significantly at this point) A screenshot of one of the better attempts at getting into orbit. I am almost positive that had I had the missing 17 Δv (1433/1450 Δv necessary) I would have been able to make it into orbit.. but Alas.. I was short. After spending the evening on launching the rocket over and over and over again.. I went to bed defeated and exhausted... ready to throw the towel in the ring and waste another 2 ingame years before the Duna Kermann Transfer window would open and I could send a new Duna Ascent Vehicle. EUREKA !!!: But text day I took one last look at the situation and I was thinking - "its a shame I can't transfer the left over Δv from the lander to the Ascent Stage..." When it dawned on me! The lander still had 135 Δv left. And when I turned the lander to avoid launching East and turn, to face South West and just launch. I had proved it had a TWR great enough to lift the Lander off the ground! It was time to lay a daring plan: Burn the lander straight up as far as the Δv allowed and point South West into the orbital trajectory of the DSRV Launch the Ascent Stage Stage separate much higher Just about reach orbit with 11 Δv left. I would lift the entire lander as high into the atmosphere as possible, at the last moment I would pitch the lander back and launch the rocket! - after all I was only 33km from escaping Dunas atmosphere (50km altitude)... and launching from a higher altitude meant the 1st stage would have less of the thicker atmospheric layers to burn through.. and it would have a little bit of a speed advantage. The result was this ( Note to myself - you should have speed up the footage): It worked - I salvaged the situation and saved the mission.. in the most kerbin of ways I think... by launching my launch platform into space. In a way I am a bit sad the "cannon" launch was not with the awesome pitch mechanics I made.. but.. I solved the problem.. and KSP is all about problem solving... right? for assorted images of the failed launch attempts see spoiler section bellow: I think I'll go back and add the final Δv margins necessary for the Accent Vehicle to work as indented. For future missions... on different low atmospheric bodies. C: Bring it Home! The DSRV picking up the DSP in Low Duna Orbit. Rendezvous with DSRV: Now that the DSP was in orbit, it was just a matter of rendezvousing. The DSP had 11 Δv left which was almost enough to complete the entire rendezvous and docking (which was good since the low thrust of the Ion Engines made fine maneuvering a bit hard. Left: The DSP positions itself "under" the DSRV Right: The DSP uses the last Δv to rendezvous with the DSRV. The DSRV matching the orbit of the DSP - Speed up 8.5 times. - notice how the m/s keeps jumping in values. After a few maneuvers the two crafts were joined and the empty fuel tank + "Ant" engine, that had brought the sample pod into orbit, was dropped in a decaying orbit. After which the DSRV boosted itself into its orbit. Finally carrying the valuable samples. Escaping Duna: Once in orbit it was just a matter of doing the multiple passes of slowly raising the AP until the vehicle had escaped Dunas SOI. But before I could start... I had to raise the vehicles orbit so it was not overshadowed by the planet: the orbit of the DSRV - notice how the trajectory from PE to AP passes through the shadow of Duna - that is the are where the escape burns has to be performed. The point from were the craft had to do its burs to escape Duna, were unfortunately on the shadow side. After raising the AP of the orbit (so the entire orbit was in the sun), it would only take 7 passes to leave Duna. The 6th pass went through Ike's SOI (but not in a good way) and subsequently had to be an a lot longer burn, as Ike was changing the probes trajectory into the wrong direction. In the subsequent pass the vehicle left Duna and was ready for the final task - getting the sample to Kerbin. A comprehensive list the DSRVs burns out of the Duna SOI - The list starts at negative numbers since burns were done from AP - which was raised to remain in the sun. Thus PE was placed lower than the starting point . Returning the Duna Sample Pod to Kerbin: The DSRV with the DSP mounted - making the finally maneuvers for a Kerbin Transfer. Notice Duna and Ike fading away in the background. Once the vehicle was out of Duna's SOI I did a course correction to intercept Kerbin and stage separated the sample pod with heatshield module from the cruise stage. I decided - that since the cruise stage had 2.500 Δv left - that it was better repurpose the cruise stage as a CommNet satelite. I think I'll place it in Kerbins orbit but on the opposing side.. Just to extend Kerbins CommNet range. The Duna Sample Pod with heatshield module decoupled from the DSRV. From now on it was just a "dumb" stage on collision course with Kerbin. The sample would then reach Kerbin and re-enter the atmosphere (unfortunately on the night side) without any further incidents Challenge Completed! - See spoiler section for re-entry and landing. The Duna Sample Pod safely back on Kerbin with its valuable cargo - waiting for a pickup. <<<<<Moving_Forward>>>>> Now that I feel the hardest challenge had been completed. I expect the next step of the mission to be a walk in the park. Next update will bring boots on the ground. The ICV Hermes is already enroute to K.G.02 for a refit and refueling. See you in the next one!