Wait- Was That Important?

So what happens when some crazy guy crashes the game as the cost of his rocket exceeds the 32-bit maximum integer I think something like monetary rewards for completing mission objectives is planned.

I mean, there was that one time when I got so frustrated with trying to build a ground base that I sent an apartment building to Duna and called it a day...

TDI Planning Phase Overview The TDI will be conducted in "waves" of vehicles sent to Duna at the latest transfer window. Each wave has a specific purpose, such as planetary colonization or orbital infrastructure development. This post is where I'll detail the contents of following waves, and the state of affairs with each one sent so far. Wave One Planning Wave one is a moderately-sized wave with four vehicles intended to establish a preliminary base of operations in Duna orbit with limited Kethane fueling technology. It will preferably map out the surface of Duna with Kethane scanners and therefore allow a base in the future to be constructed. -Reusable ship to be sent with cargo to Duna, refueled there, and back to Kerbin for reuse -Reusable tug to be sent with cargo to Duna, refueled there, and back to Kerbin for reuse -Duna hub control module to be sent to Duna -Fuel depot and 2.5m docking hub to be sent and connected to the Duna hub -Reusable lander/ miner to mine Kethane from the surface and conduct limited exploration -Orbital tender as a means of quick egress from Duna orbit back to Kerbin orbit Wave Two Planning Wave two establishes a ground presence on Duna, in the form of two colonization modules and a rover. This package, intended to be one piece, allows exploration of the Red planet. At the same time, another tug will be constructed, and a specialized lander will be sent to the ship from Wave one allowing it to operate in the Joolian system. A small Ike outpost will be sent with a rebuilt orbital tender to get back and forth from Duna orbit. This allows for Kethane and possibly metal mining operations in the future on both Duna and Ike. The tug and ship from wave one will both be sent back to Kerbin. -Two habitat modules for the surface of Duna and a rover allowing travel between the two -A second reusable tug module for pushing the aforementioned habitats to Duna -An Ike outpost to be pushed by one of the Tugs for study of Ike, with a probe for a polar Ike orbit -An Ike/ Duna orbital tender with Duna to Kerbin capabilities after refueling, sent independently -A specially made lander for Joolian operations with the Wave One ship -Refueling of the Tug and Ship after arrival in Kerbin orbit

I think I'm as excited as I was for the release of GTA V for this mod's release as well. Good luck! I'm sort of curious, though scared that it'll be a huge and confusing answer, as to why you didn't implement rotation. Surely it's just a matter of transmitting an extra value over the server and syncing it up? Also, why wasn't there a chat GUI in the demonstration video?

The Trans-Duna Initiative Overview In an effort to create a sensible and sustainable Duna program, I've begun the Trans-Duna Initiative, or TDI. The goals of this program are simple: establish a continuous and significant Kerbal presence in the Duna system with a moderate initial investment followed by waves of further development. Fueled by Kethane landers operating from Duna, the infrastructure here will serve as both an experiment for long-term extra-Kerbin habitation and a base for further exploration. Goals The goals of this program are simple. 1.) Establish a sufficient Kerbal presence to support further colonization efforts 2.) Develop infrastructure capable of processing Kethane into requisite fuels indefinitely 3.) Explore and map the Duna system 4.) Colonize and have access to the surface of Duna and Ike 5.) Ultimately, make the Duna assets self-sufficient and no longer reliant on shipments from Kerbin Process As it is now, the program is a regimented one with little room for failure. The program is designed to be conducted in waves, groups of infrastructure sent from Kerbin to Duna at each transfer window. Each wave usually has one craft intended for return to Kerbin at the next Duna to Kerbin window, as a way of transporting samples and data gained that cannot be sent over the communications networks. Detailed explanations of each wave are offered in lieu of an extensive writeup. Ladies and gentlemen, without further adieu, I present to you the Trans-Duna Initiative. Wave one contains all the infrastructure needed for immediate operation commencement at Duna. Below is an album containing pictures each ship sent, with explanations of their design and purpose. Wave One was intended to be an almost exclusively orbital operation, with only the lander actually touching down on Duna. In later waves, the surface of Duna will be colonized and explored both robotically and by brave kolonists. Wave One has a success rate of 84% so far. Out of the six vehicles sent to Duna, only the Duna Tender I failed, and that was only because of some timewarp-derived SOI orbit bugs and Ike shenanigans. The crew, still blissfully unaware of their predicament in cryogenic sleep (the lazy jerks), are now stranded in the southern hemisphere of Duna, far out of the intended operation envelope of the Duna lander. We can only hope that they're able to be rescued before their insufficient survival equipment fails. Here is the album chronicling the almost complete (mis)adventures of Wave One.

This is a very well put-together post, good job. I agree, but have the same reservations as Kodiak above me; like reentry effects, these dynamic particle effects could easily be too stressful on the game.

While I agree, I feel that it's incredibly easy to make an overlarge or distractingly gaudy cursor. If the KSP devs made a minimalist alternative that was more KSP appropriate, perhaps that would be better than what we have now.

Use Imgur to upload things for free. My record, with this KW monster, was 134.552 tons as measured by Engineer. I think it was something like 50,000 liquid fuel to launch this. Yay sandbox mode! It was the second ship in a now-defunct program to go directly to Jool without passing GO or collecting $200. I'd love to know how to insert Albums here as well.

RIP Scott. May you find another horizon beyond this one.

Thank you very much! They're excellent!

I've had only two encounters with debris. The first was a strut end, which fell off because of that weird glitch where putting them attached to bicouplers makes the ends decouple and float around, which came within a paltry 5.6km. The other was the entire second stage of one of my KW launch vehicles, which I had jettisoned immediately after using it to get a close intercept with a station. A few orbits later the entire thing, which is like 10 meters tall and weighs 17 tons dry, smacked right into the middle of my station at about 75m/s closing speed. No more station after that The bottom part of this rocket is the second stage. It's in 3.75m diameter, so it's fairly large on its own.

Also, for the sake of restitution, here's a flag I made so you can fly this bizarre dolphin proudly over your historic landing sites. And if there are any anons on the KSP forums, here's one for you guys you magnificent devils.

Could somebody resize this: To be a flag? And if you want to get a little cropping practice in there too, I'd love this: To be made into a flag as well. Thanks in advance!

This would essentially force me to get KerbTown. Nice work! I hope to see it released soon!

That's really an internet connection problem. It means you can't connect to the server, essentially.

Duna, because it's easy to build a reusable architecture for colonizing and exploring it. Ike is fun too.

Hey, just another question that I'd love to see how you dealt with. If Prima's ship is on a 500-day intercept trajectory with Jool, and Secunda's is on an 80 day intercept trajectory with Duna, how will that work out when the server timewarps? Or does it timewarp all the ships to a set time before their arrival? For that matter, do you have hours or minutes before a timewarp finishes?

I specified in-space for a reason. Timewarp kills angular velocity instantly without and reactions occurring, whereas ASAS wastes fuel but doesn't require the effort of doing it manually. ASAS is good for limited station keeping in my opinion, as I said above, but I find that just hitting > is easier than actually using RCS or reaction wheels. I was just curious as to what others use.

Oh wow, gratz. I guess you guys didn't have to deal with the jumpiness of the KLF map when timewarping. How are you dealing with organizing different people's flights? KLF used colors, though once you get to more than 10 people I'd imagine that becomes a pain. Can you accidentally click on other people's flights while trying to make a maneuver node? Can you target other players' ships, an invaluable part of interacting with others?. I don't want to overly grill you guys, I'm just curious. It's a problem that's secondary to timewarping but still very much an issue. Also, about the timewarp thing, what if one person (Prima) has a Joolian intercept in 256 days and another (Secunda) has a Duna intercept in 146. Won't Secunda's ship just wind up flying past Duna so that Prima's flight can make it? Will there have to be correspondence?

Sometimes it comes as a shock to me that people use ASAS on rockets and in-space vehicles. If I want to keep a stationary ship from drifting I'll let it control the reaction wheels sometimes, otherwise time warp is my ASAS (see signature). For that matter, I don't think I've ever had ASAS use the RCS. It's like the two are mutually exclusive for me. I've docked 80 ton vehicles with less than 120 RCS before because I use timewarp to stop my velocity instead of the highly inefficient ASAS. At the same time, I realize that timewarp isn't exactly a realistic feature, and using it as a "kill-all-angular-velocity-for-free" button might be seen cheating as some. I just value the fact that I can either stop whatever vector change manually or timewarp, and that I'm now completely isolated from the ASAS arguments which were ongoing back when 0.21 came out. So, my question to you guys is, what do you use and why? Timewarp, ASAS, or manual-only? For realism's sake or convenience's?

If you're like me, and have no idea of rendezvous or matching orbits, prepare yourself for an ordeal. It took me 21 missions to successfully make the rendezvous and another 5 to work out design kinks. Granted, it was the third type of mission (I went: launch a rocket that goes to space, make orbit, build space station). Essentially, all you have to have is a hitchhiker for kerbal storage, some solar panels and batteries, RCS, and an open docking port. If you're like me, you can split that up into lightweight modules, which give you more dV and thus more wiggle room. I suggest one main centerpiece module (that can act as an independent station until you send up the rest of the modules), a habitation module (with room for 10 or so Kerbals), a power module (this is mostly decoratory as nothing in KSP really eats that much juice at this point), and a docking module (with plenty of open room for multiple ships and probes to dock). You can get fancy with dedicated probe modules, science modules, fuel modules, etc. etc. but what I said above will suffice for a simple in-space hub to send your ships, extra kerbals, and probes. I built a mini-station once with room for 8 probes and sent it to Duna. That was actually really fun to do, but the station itself was actually monolithic (being fully functional in one part). I've yet to successfully build a station beyond the Mun but that's just another challenge to tackle.

Tyranids! I don't do it that much any more. It's a big timesink and I don't like dropping the cash, but when I did play I formed an opinion that I want to put out here... I felt that the Tau were seriously overpowered. Their infantry are decent, they have plenty of units, but the battle suits... yeesh. For nearly a third the cost of a Tyranid warrior my friend could field something with twice the weaponry and armor. Not only that, but the ability to deploy them three turns in right next to your Tyrant with a Melta made me ragequit more than once. What do you guys think of the Tau battlesuits? I think they're seriously overpowered; they cost too little and have too many weapons. Or is it just that Tyranids are underpowered?

I'm just curious about the chat client and map view. I'm sure if you talked very sweetly to the creator of KLF you'd get his blessing to tear down the code he used. That might make it easy for you guys when coming to deal with that sort of thing, and probably shave some time off of development.

I once aligned two ships' vectors with each other to prepare for docking... ...at 116m/s. Suffice to say, you should always pay attention to your speedometer. It was a pain to get rid of the debris.

-applying makeup to Duna face -planning spontaneous and catastrophic disassembly -loading secret planet