Good morning! I have been playing a number of years but I'm a first time poster. Having used the forums as a source of information to help me out when I get stuck.
I have found that KSP is a game that suits me well. I have found that it is a really good learning curve. The first time I managed to dock I did so by meticulously following the tutorial and even then it took me the better part of an hour to do a really messy docking operation . Now I'm an "old hand" at docking, building things in orbit, docking lifters on top of craft on moons and so on.
I have started a number of Careers and I also have a sandbox that I "play" in for testing ideas.
With the release of KSP2 I found that my computer just doesn't have the capacity to run it. So I've started a new Career in KSP1
Part of the fun of KSP is that it is open ended so you can set your own goals and play it your own way.
For this career I'm doing something a bit different. I'm playing to get things accomplished as quickly as possible, in game time. This means that instead of building a ship that just enough Delta V and time warping months (or years) to the optimum launch window, that I'm setting up mining infrastructure and building ships in orbit that have lots of delta V to get places quickly.
My self imposed rules for this game are.
- Playing normal difficulty.
- I allow myself "revert to launch"
- If I loose a kerbal (due to a mistake or more likely, the Kraken) I allow myself to revert to a savegame.
- Likewise failing missions (I haven't yet) again allow revert to former savegame.
- Stock Only! No Mods! (this makes knowing how much Delta V an orbital constructed ship has a real challenge)
- No buying Kerbals! The only additional kerbals are those that I have rescued for Missions.
At present I'm up to Day 60. Progress is exciting!
- Mining operations on the Mun and Minimus
- Communications net for Mun and Minimus
- Science tree is now maxed out.
- I have sent a sip to Eve with Communications satellites for Eve and Gilly as well as a Resource scanner Scanner
- I have sent a ship to Eve (about day 55) with a mining unit for Gilly. There is a module for Science and a "InterPlanetary Transfer Pod" (IPTP) with space for 6 kerbals which will come back with sweet experience Kerbals.
- 3 asteroids already captured!
- I'm building a ship to go to Moho. Almost assembled and half fueled up.
interesting things I have found on the way.....
- When completing "into sol orbit" missions you can burn out and back, hard. You can do it in 3 days. However for the Kerbal to register as having got into Sol Orbit you have to have the craft in view as it exits Kerbins sphere of influence. It took me about 4 tries, sending the same Kerbals out, a lot of head scratching and a read of the forums to work that out. So hot tip, set an alarm clock for one minute and "sit" on the ship.
- With refineries you don't need fuel for the return trip. Using the refueling at Mun and Minimus means that you can have smaller craft, smaller booster, the whole lot gets smaller. When coming back from Mun or Minimus I dock with a LKO station and transfer excess fuel.
- On the other hand, have spare fuel....
- you can assemble ships in orbit. By attaching Large Liquid fuel tanks together with decouplers you can build ships with 10K+ Delta V
- When setting such a large ship on its way I burn to the point where a number of tanks are exhausted, detach them, and then burn them back to Kerbin for reuse.
- Refineries. You can "set and forget". Having a refinery close to the equator is more important than squeezing absolute maximum ore yield. Also, when looking for a location for a Refinery I'm looking for something as flat as possible. So I don't have to chase fuel trucks up and down slopes.
- Sub-assemblies. Use them often! Especially for Boosters. That way you can select the "Thumper with pointy nosecone" hit 4 x radial and attach it.
- You might have to play with sub-assemblies to optimise them. I have a standard 7xNerv engine unit (7 x Nerv 7 x 400 Liquid fuel Fuselage tanks) that has now evolved to a Mark 3. Mark 1 had a single reaction wheel. that just wasn't enough.
- A single Nerv "tug" is really efficient, but I found that moving a full tank (or tanks) needed 10+ minute burns. When operating in the Kerbin/Mun/Minimus system the burns are too long when you have things landing, or renfueling
- You don't need all the tech tree.... I got some missions to repair satellites that had Advanced scanning units aboard them. One the mission was complete I took the scanner back to LKO to attach to a scanner satellite. Saving not just the cost, but far more importantly the need to have tech tree maxed out before using it.
- How you think about how "hard" it is to get to places changes a bit. The closer a planet is to Kerbol the shorter the orbital period and the more often a launch window comes up. In this context Moho is "easy" as although there is a greater delta v requirement than other planets the opportunities to transit are more frequent.
- The alarm clock is critical! I get something on it's way and set a clock. There is no way I could keep track of what I have out there without it. I have developed a shorthand for the descriptors so I know what I'm doing next for example "Mun Heavy Liquid fuel station ren" means that the Heavy Liquid fuel lander will be rendezvousing with the Station in Mun orbit.
What next!
- Get that Moho ship on it's way! plan for that is to get to Moho, refuel and then burn to Eve. Kerbols from both Moho and Eve trips will then be coming home
- Build a new ship to get to Duna and set up a mining operation there as well. Perhaps on Ike
- Set up a network of "recovery" ships that will sit in orbit around Kerbin and "catch" IPTP's as they come back home. I've alroeady set up marker buoys for this purpose.
- Start cleaning up Debris from completed missions where rovers and satellites have been repaired. Get some money back and tidy things up!
I'll be doing the odd update, next time screenshots.
Cheers
