KevinTMC

Glad the forums are back up, as I've just about completed my mission for this challenge. And what an great, all-consuming adventure it's been...thanks so much for doing this, Death Engineering. As I wrap things up, I've got a scoring question related to a small mistake I made. (I'm a scrupulous and rule-oriented sort of person, so I tend to have such questions; sorry if it's a bother.) Here's the situation. I designed my mission so that the water sample from the pole returns to Kerbin separately from the command module. I had this sample on its way back to Kerbin on a nice trajectory that would result in aerocapture...but then time-accelerated a bit too far, missing the encounter. (I guess I've gotten too used to using Kerbal Alarm Clock, which wasn't there to help me since I'm flying the challenge on a mod-free installation.) Right before time-warping, I had quicksaved (as I do from time to time in case of game crashes). I reloaded from this quicksave, time-accelerated more carefully, and returned the sample safely to Kerbin. The only part of the mission that was repeated was the time warp (there were no actual flight maneuvers that needed to be redone) and none of this messing about affected any part of the mission beyond the return of the water sample. So: Am I still entitled to the water sample return bonus? Or must the water sample be considered lost in space due to my fast-forwarding flub? Oh, and while I'm at it, just to clarify: It's not a problem if one has used mission-planning tools (like alexmoon's Launch Window Planner), or built the craft using VAB aids (like Editor Extensions), so long as the final craft is built from stock parts only, and the mission is flown without the assistance of any mods...correct?

I just downloaded the 0.61 zip...everything is now in a folder named "kOS". So do we now just pop this folder into GameData as with other current mods?

Most of the time, I'm a big keyboard person...but I like using my gamepad--a Logitech RumblePad 2--for flying both rockets and planes in KSP. The twin sticks are mapped to the pitch and yaw (left stick) and roll (right stick) axes; the trigger buttons on the left control throttle; the four buttons on top and trigger buttons on the right are for translation; other buttons toggle RCS and SAS and map mode and precision control. There's of course plenty of things, such as action groups, that the pad doesn't have enough buttons for, and of course it's not of much use in map mode or the VAB, but I do enjoy flying with it. I do have to use the keyboard for EVAs...in version 0.21.1, jetpacks tend to freak out from time to time, for some reason, if I've mapped any of the EVA controls to the gamepad (even if I'm trying to use the keyboard for control at that moment).

Yes, Engineer got really confused with the craft I built for the "Doing it Apollo style" challenge, which calls for the Munar Module's descent engine to be left behind on the Mun. I attached an engine to the bottom of the craft, and used fuel lines to connect it to tanks above the decoupler. Engineer wouldn't calculate anything properly for that stage, or for any of the stages above it in the stack.

I've seen where Squad says that; but it doesn't seem quite right. Wouldn't that imply that nothing further is to be added to sandbox mode? (Not even the science parts they're working on right this minute, or better aerodynamics?)

I agree that the change in tone is something that naturally accompanies the player's growth and expertise...and I think it would be a great idea if Career Mode was designed with this in mind. I've made the case for this in other threads; but in short, there's room for an improvisational air, lots of trial and error and explosions, and even trips to the junkyard in the early phases of the KSP career. I refer the reader to the famous picture of the Original Seven...with Slayton and Glenn sporting spray-painted work boots. Very Kerbal, as was so much of the Mercury program. It's only natural for things to get more professional and less reckless as the program develops (though still not po-faced! there should always be room for the whimsical touch in KSP, and Kerbals should always make the player smile), and Career Mode can reflect that in the new parts and technologies that it introduces later in the game.

That Gemini mission is really cool and a fun change of pace...thanks for sharing it, Death Engineering. Maybe someone should create a "Doing it Gemini style" challenge!

"Spider" was probably my favorite too, followed by "Galileo Was Right". Having worked (just a little) in the news business before, I was also fond of "We Interrupt This Program". I think it's an underrated episode...and handled masterfully the problem of "how do we do an Apollo 13 episode when the movie about it was just made a couple years ago?"

SHORT VERSION OF POST: Professor Lewin's renowned 8.01X course at MIT has been packaged for the online edX format, is starting soon, and is free for anyone anywhere in the world to take. Who's in? LONG VERSION OF POST: "So...physics! Physics, eh? Physics! Phyyyysics! Physics, physics, physics, physics, physics. I hope you're getting all this down..." (Dr. Who quote shamelessly nicked from Jack Wolfe's sig) Anyhow, I never learned much physics in the classroom. My high school physics course was quite sad on several levels; while the unit of physics I took in college, from an endearingly goofy Cajun tennis player, was fun but very watered-down for us hardcore liberal arts types. Since neither my father nor my brother enjoyed physics much either, or ever got that far in it (even though they were science majors themselves: chemistry and biology respectively) I had half-decided it was hopeless to try to learn. Maybe there was even some bizarre genetic defect at work. Playing Kerbal Space Program, off and on for the past 14 months, has changed my attitude utterly. I'm both hungry to know more of the science, and optimistic that some of it might even take root in my head. It got my attention, then, when a post about this course turned up in my Facebook news feed today: (I'd been keeping an eye on the edX project for work reasons--I've got a ground-level student-services job at a university.) I may be biting off more than I can chew (I hope I can dig enough high-school math out of the recesses of my brain, and/or find enough time to review materials from the co-requisite calculus course, to survive!), but I've registered and I'm going to give it a go. How about the rest of the KSP community? Will I have company...or is everyone else either already too advanced for this course, not interested in this sort of thing, too bereft of spare time, or just not as crazy as I am?

Yup. That's why I don't risk an earlier turn unless I'm flying a smallish rocket. Also, it's my understanding that the bigger the beast, the more urgent it is to get it out of the lower atmosphere...and straight up is the fastest way.

I was glad to see that Xeldrak and others enjoyed my challenge entry, "Apollo K". I hope it won't be minded, then, that I just couldn't leave the challenge alone. I made some tweaks to the craft, spent a lot of time practicing landing with the single small descent engine used in my design, and then launched again with another crew. I've posted the results as a four-part epilogue, The Apollo K-R Mission, added to my original thread in Mission Reports. As I mention in the thread, I don't know if this entitles me to another, higher score; I'm not much bothered either way. The main thing was, I wanted to do it again, and do it right. (And especially, to learn whether achieving a pinpoint landing using only the one Rockomax 48-7S, with its whopping 20kN of thrust, was at all possible--while leaving enough fuel in the tank for ascent too, of course.) Thank you again for this excellent challenge, Xeldrak...and I hope that making Thread of the Month hasn't put you to too much work!

EPILOGUE IV After one last flyby of the landing site, Apollo K-R burned for home. It re-entered the atmosphere for some aerobraking. A parking orbit was established, as plenty of fuel remained; the crew then picked a spot in the ocean west of the big crater on Kerbin, and came in steeply but smoothly for a water landing as the sun disappeared over the horizon. Splashdown was at MET 2d 10h 20m. This time, all point-scoring objectives for the challenge mission were met. The slight modifications to the original Apollo K craft did not affect the design objectives, and once again the mission was flown without the assistance of mods, so the 30 base points were earned: As were the following design goals: As were the following flight goals and bonuses: While the following penalties were avoided: (And I don't believe any other penalties would apply for the first, abortive flight, since all kerbonauts returned safely.) That would be the full 218 points possible...if it all counts. There are three reasons that it might not count: 1) This second attempt at the challenge is essentially a repeat/redo/refly, as it uses basically the same craft and mission profile as before. I'm not sure if that's within the spirit of the challenge, or if a second attempt is expected to be more different in nature. 2) I wound up reloading from a quicksave, once, as a result of a staging glitch. This happened when I detached the Munar Module for landing and attempted to start the descent burn. I hit the space bar to trigger the next stage, which should have activated the descent engine--but the engine was jettisoned instead. I reloaded to try it again...and this time I decided to not chance the staging system, activating the descent engine via the right-click menu on the part instead. 3) The solar panel providing power to the last of the MSEP modules was in a broken state on delivery. Due to the current state of the game's features and glitches, this was not fixable by my kerbonaut...but after I left the scene and came back again, the solar panel was good as new and the module operated perfectly. I'm not sure if this means the module still qualified as having "power, probecore and at least one science-thingy" or not; if not, then I only successfully deployed three modules, reducing my MSEP score (and final score) by 5 points. I mention these details, not to be a pain in the neck, but because I want everything to be proper and correct if I am going to be awarded a second, higher score. I won't be terribly bothered any which way, though; the reason I revisited this challenge with the new Apollo K-R mission was not to score points or impress people, but because the challenge was simply so compelling that I wanted to keep at it until I got it right. Many thanks, again, to Xeldrak for inspiring all this fun.

EPILOGUE III Dunvis took the rover out to deliver the Munar Surface Experiment Package modules. He was under strict instructions to follow a relatively level path that had been plotted out across the surface, avoiding all craters. MSEP #1 MSEP #2 MSEP #3 MSEP #4 By the time the fourth MSEP module was deployed, the rover had flipped over a couple of times--thankfully, without triggering any explosions or spontaneous disassembly--and had just started to climb a fairly steep hill, as Dunvis was drifting ever further from strict observance of his instructions, and had thoughts of doing some fun exploring once the science modules were off his hands. But without any remaining MSEPs (and their reaction-wheel-containing probe cores), and attempting to climb further up that significant hill, the rover quickly became uncontrollable. Dunvis grew tired of the slow and erratic movement and continual flipping, and abandoned the rover (upside down again, for about the ninth time) less than 400 meters from where he had deployed the last module. A look back across the rugged munar landscape The return trip via jetpack was quick and easy. As Dunvis approached MM Jebill, he noticed that the flag that had been planted earlier had been eaten by the space Kraken (or perhaps by Hanbin). So he planted a new one atop the monument. And then it was time to catch a ride back to Kerbin. Less than half an orbit was required for rendezvous and docking. The crew was transferred back to the Command Module on the night side of the Mun... ...and then it was time for MM Jebill's final journey, back to the munar surface.

EPILOGUE II After returning safely home, Dunvis, Hanbin, and Ronely huddled with Kerbal Space Center engineers to try to determine what had gone wrong. The explanation they settled on was that the craft had twisted itself apart at stage separation because: a) SAS and RCS had both been left on at separation, and someone had forgotten to turn the Munar Module's RCS thrusters off at launch (Action Group 0, for those keeping score at home). No changes were made to the Apollo K-R spacecraft after this failure, then; an identical craft was simply cued up for another dawn launch (with additional, more emphatic sticky notes added to the dashboard). Separation of first stage. Staging was altered for the Apollo K-R so that the escape tower no longer separated with the first stage. Instead, the escape engines were triggered after the activation of the second stage...and the tower was left attached for most of the escape-engine burn, in the hopes of squeezing some tiny bit of delta-v out of the tiny SRBs. This time, ascent to orbit was more efficient, and the second stage was able to achieve a free return trajectory with fuel to spare. Since a non-trivial amount of fuel remained, and since more precise debris control would be possible closer to the Mun, and since it seemed agreeable to most everyone involved to put off the next, nerve-wracking staging for a while yet, the second stage was brought along all the way to the munar sphere of influence. The second stage engines gave Apollo K-R a good start on its munar insertion burn, and altered course so that all debris would smack squarely into the Mun. Then, after double-checking the checklist (and quintuple-checking that RCS was turned off), breaths were held for staging. It went without a hitch; and the debris field was perfectly set up for bombing the Mun. After crew transfer, undocking, and redocking, a brief burn from the Command Module's engines pulled the craft out of an impact trajectory. Orbit was established at 20km; thanks to the design revisions, the munar sub-satellite could then be promptly released. As had been the case with Apollo K, the kerbonauts arrived in orbit to find the Neil Armstrong Monment in darkness; but this time, they only had to wait six hours until there was enough light to attempt a landing. Recalling the decision Jeb had made to name his Munar Module after his Command Module Pilot, the crew of Apollo K-R chose to name their lander after the other two members of the Apollo K crew. Munar Module Jebill Hanbin and Dunvis carefully followed the descent plan that they had so painstakingly worked out by trial and error, and things went even more smoothly than in the simulator. About a hundred meters from the surface, they were a bit farther from the target than desired; a quick check of the fuel situation showed that they had plenty of time to maneuver, and so they did, finally setting the craft down gently just inside the 100m target range. The flag for this mission was an empty outline of a space capsule, chosen in memory of the two seats that had remained empty inside the Apollo K Command Module as it made its lonely way home.

EPILOGUE I Apollo K was not going to be the end of kerballed space exploration. Everyone at Kerbal Space Center knew in their hearts that this was what they were created to do, and to keep on doing, whether it brought success or catastrophe or some mixture of both. The Apollo Pre-K test crew of Dunvis, Hanbin, and Ronely Kerman was particularly eager to get back into space and complete the mission. Before they could do so, an important question had to be addressed: was the Apollo K lander capable of making a precision landing on the Mun and then returning to orbit, or was it fatally underpowered? Most were inclined to believe the latter. (Jeb and Bill had fired up all three engines and still barely made it down safely, after all.) Spacecraft engineers were able to save some weight when they realized that including an old-style ASAS module on the lander was excessive (it was especially preposterous in the descent phase, seeing as no fewer than five reaction-wheel-containing parts were already attached to the rover). They also got rid of the deck chairs, since not even Jeb had been crazy enough to use them. Even so, as simulations got underway it still seemed a stiff challenge to land the Munar Module using only the single Rockomax 48-7S. But Commander Dunvis Kerman and Munar Module Pilot Hanbin Kerman kept at it, enduring simulated crash after simulated crash until they started to feel their way towards a solution. By starting from a lower, 20km orbit, angling the burn carefully so as to not let vertical velocity get too high (about 20-25m/s seemed right until horizontal velocity was canceled), and coasting very little if at all during any phase of the descent, Dunvis and Hanbin were eventually able to simulate a safe landing using just the descent engine. Prospects for ascent looked fine as well, as leaving the less-efficient radial engines off during descent helped the fuel situation considerably. And so, after having considered more radical changes, spacecraft engineers made only modest tweaks to the Apollo K craft in the end. Along with the changes to the Munar Module, a better place for the sub-satellite was found (under the Munar Module, instead of on top of the Command Module), a proper stack separator was added between the Command Module engine and the Munar Module, and the weight of the escape tower was reduced a little. The Apollo K, Revised spacecraft (or Apollo K-R) was ready to fly. Dunvis, Hanbin, and Ronely launched at dawn, and reached orbit safely... ...but the second stage had less fuel remaining than would be needed to complete the transfer burn. This time, the two-burn transfer plan would be required. The second stage burned towards munar intercept until its fuel was nearly exhausted; the craft then coasted out to its new, very high apokee. Remaining second-stage fuel was spent to tip the perikee back down into the low atmosphere, for debris control purposes; staging was then executed... ...and went very wrong, with the top two-thirds of the Command Module cut loose from the rest of the spacecraft. The crew suddenly found themselves separated from all engines; and while RCS thrusters were still on board, RCS fuel was not. To say they were thankful for being on a return trajectory would be a vast understatement. (Remember kids: debris control isn't just cool, it saves lives!)

I think that's a fair assessment. Some people around here are too protective of the development team; others are too relentlessly critical; but overall, the community is excellent, and I think we'll be okay so long as the overall tone of discussion doesn't get dragged too far to the extremes. Though I try to err on the side of gratitude, myself. Because I've found gratitude to be a great place to start from and to keep returning to, when thinking about and reacting to most things in life. (Not that I'm perfect at it, by any means...but the better I get at it, the happier I am.)

Maybe I'm just getting old, but that right there is plenty alarming and shocking to me.

Good grief, Apollo13 and dr_jt...I knew times were still tough, but I'd thought the IT field still had more promise than that. I'd been looking a bit longingly at it, as a matter of fact, from the perspective of a household where we have one underemployed lawyer whose legal career never even got started, and one accomplished, veteran teacher who is having trouble even finding subbing gigs anymore. (You know times are tough when teachers can't even afford to take sick days when they're sick.)

All I know is, I've gotten 14 months (and counting) of outstanding entertainment and edification out of a product I paid less than $20 for. I'm not wealthy--I live on a rather tight budget in fact--but KSP has been an outstanding bargain for me. Maybe, in theory, I've paid for a future finished product, and in that sense I haven't yet gotten my money's worth; but in practice, I can't bring myself to care. Now I'm eager to see KSP become the best product it can be. I wouldn't tell anyone to just get over their gameplay gripes (most of which I share, and most of which I trust will be fixed eventually--if not nearly as soon as I would wish for, if my wishing were enough). But it wouldn't occur to me in a million years to play the "I paid good money for this!" card when something breaks or displeases me. To my mind, I have already gotten my money's worth, many many times over.

That jumped out at me too. Part of it's that KSP is single-player, so a new player's explosive failures aren't threatening the success of anyone else's missions. But a larger part of it is that there are many knowledgeable and helpful people here who are eager to see others learn and happy to offer help...and that's done much to define the basic tone for the forums.

Yes, there are times when folks on these forums have to be told to chill out. It's not a perfect place and never will be; but it's better than most places on the Internet, that's for sure. Also, those of us who believe in civility have a duty to consistently model the behavior we advocate. That includes not complaining too much about the fact that other users, in our view, complain too much. (A tricky business, I know!)

I agree. Constructive, polite criticism always seems welcome here. The picture some people paint, of heavy-handed moderation producing cowed silence and uniformity of opinion, is not at all what I've ever seen on these forums. I might feel differently if I placed a high value on being able to let it all hang out, in all sorts of settings. Instead, I believe self-expression must always be tempered by self control and concern for others; and I was raised with the saying that if you can't say something nice, that often means you shouldn't say anything at all. (Constructive criticism of specific shortcomings of the game, written about in a civil manner, absolutely counts as "something nice" in my book. Telling someone that their fan-made creation stinks--without gentleness, and without helpful suggestions for improvement--doesn't.)

As I said, constructive criticism is always in order. As early-access players, it's kind of our job, even. Also, lest anyone mistake my intent here--I'm not calling anyone out with this article. The KSP forums are a great place, and I'm proud of the userbase. This is not a "hey...stop it!" post; but rather a "whoa! let's be sure we never go anywhere near there" post.

The nice thing about the Internet is that it makes it so easy to find and contact and communicate with people. The problem with the Internet is that it makes it so easy to find and contact and communicate with people. Plague of game dev harassment erodes industry, spurs support groups We've got an awesome game here, and a great team of developers. While constructive and precise criticism is always in order--we are all alpha/beta testers after all--we should also make an effort to be supportive, to be good to HarvesteR & co. Because toxic communities (even smallish bands of toxic users within communities) do kill games and drive developers out of the industry.

My first flight sim was the subLOGIC Flight Simulator for the Apple II. It came with two manuals; the one devoted to "Flight Physics and Aircraft Control" wouldn't have been too out of place in a general flight training course. This game was rather hard. A family friend who actually owned and flew a Cessna was, in fact, of the opinion that it was harder than real-life flying. I spent a lot of hours on it anyway, especially in the WWI Ace battle game. More accessible and fun (if rather less realistic) was F-15 Strike Eagle. (Good old Sid Meier again!) There were enough different keyboard controls that I played with a friend and we divided up tasks (just like in a real F-15E!).