capi3101

(1.5.1, T-8 days to 1.6.x) Yesterday can best be described using the kind of invective that the forum administrators have expressly forbidden, which in this case is unfortunate. No screenies today, and that's probably for the best. A thorough investigation at the South Base near KSC into the reasons why it's not producing Slag came up empty. As far as I can tell all the necessary preconditions - positive base productivity (+8), operating Geology Lab Prospector unit, working drill and dedicated Slag warehouse - are there, but still nothing is happening. KML'd the warehouse half full; that will at least get me to the point where I can make Konkrete there. I would've preferred to do things the intended way. Oh well... Assembly of the new Boot Hill base on Mun also went awry; something is borked badly either with my local instance of KSP, KAS and/or Pathfinder. I've got bits and pieces of bases that connect just fine, but then when I go back to look at them later, there are 2-3 meter gaps everywhere. The base's remote exotic minerals processor destroyed itself three times during assembly yesterday, and this morning the main base has managed to turn itself 90 degrees; the TBD 7b base-seeding rover is still attached and is now listing 45 degrees to port; I'm afraid the damn thing's going to tip over and kill a pair of very smart kerbals in the process... So not much done these past 24 hours. I may proceed with an upgrade to 1.6.x early and do a fresh start of everything if this all continues today. I should at least take LSV House Harkonnen out for one spin before calling it quits, though...

(1.5.1, T-9 days to 1.6.x) Had a fairly frustrating day yesterday. With planetary operations over Kerbin suspended following Monday's Kraken attack on Swamp Castle and the base's subsequent complete loss, I wanted to get a new south base facility up as quickly as I possibly could. To that end, I designed a Buffalo craft to haul all the remaining structures along with the Equipment needed to deploy them directly from KSC. The resultant craft, dubbed Flying Circus 7, deployed from KSC 09 costing me √440k; this was still less than the cost of one of my old Piper Alpha 7 refinery craft, so I dealt with it. Had some issues getting it off the Runway ramp initially but ultimately it made it to the South Base site and engineer Beamon Kerman began a rapid expansion project. The damn Kraken decided to strike again, first knocking all the wheels off the Flying Circus and then blowing several of the storage structures as the base continued to grow, knocking several of them askew for good measure. The base looks like crap now, but at least all the intended industrial structures are up and running, so operations began to deploy a new ground Pipeline mass driver. The base is still not making any Slag for Konkrete production, which has me perplexed - it has the storage structure needed, it has the drills, it has the required lab going, it has a positive productivity rating, but still no Slag... Pump-filling of the exotic matter tank aboard LSV House Harkonnen continued yesterday. I reached 513 XM before the day was out, which was over my original target goal of 500 for the craft. At this point I'm content to allow Harkonnen to continue on to Minmus to complete Xenon fueling before beginning its first mission, which will be to proceed to a position over Kerbol for final XM fueling before heading on to a Duna flyby. Meanwhile, I went ahead and brought the craft's onboard dockyard online, even though with no one aboard I can't actually use the thing yet. LSV House Harkonnen, ready to dominate the spice trade. The ferry ship Next Objective reached Mun yesterday and put into dock at the Non Caseus Yards, where a TBD 7b base-seeding rover had been printed up for establishment of a new Mun outpost. Next Objective putting into dock at NCY, with the TBD rover visible. Pilot Billy-Bobcal Kerman, scientist Wenmy Kerman and engineer Chadul Kerman boarded the rover, final checks were completed and the drydock clamps released: TBD 7b under power. The crew ultimately set the rover down about 6 kilometers west of the target zone, roughly 900 meters from the skycrane of the Hellhound 7 rover Rogue 5, which was still in the area. Originally I went ahead with the rove and base construction despite it being morning twilight in the area, but the Kraken decided to attack the nascent base as well and I pulled a revert. I'll be attempting construction again this morning. Meanwhile, with the dock finally cleared out and with a junk-and-kerbal rescue contract at Mun to fulfill, a Bill Clinton 7b grabber probe was ordered up at NCY. Building is the order of business for today. I need to reassess the issues going on at South Base and re-print the structures I need to carry on operations, as well as figure out why Slag production isn't happening. The TBD mission will continue, and with luck I'll be able to carry out the aforementioned rescue mission as well. Kinda hoping to get to use House Harkonnen in her primary flight mode at some point today as well.

(1.5.1, T-10 days to 1.6.x) It was a slow day (but an important one) yesterday owing to events in RL. The day began with the flight of an Auk XIII single-passenger spaceplane, carrying tourist Chadsey Kerman up to space station Kerbinport. The plane's departure necessitated a catch-up maneuver with Kerbinport so the rendezvous took much longer than normal, but ultimately it did arrive and dock safely. Chadsey swapped places with rescuee Ribsted Kerman, recently retrieved from Minmus aboard the ferry ship Next Objective. Ribsted departed Kerbinport and made his way to the surface, landing safely at KSC 27. While Chadsey was still on his way to Kerbinport, the Dystopia Planitia orbital shipyard reported that construction of LSV House Harkonnen was complete. An initial attempt to send fuel for the ship from the Swamp Castle outpost near KSC did not go so well - the game reported the base crashing into the ground and it wouldn't let me switch between craft, and yet the base still looked intact and some fuel and enriched uranium were successfully transferred. It was abundantly clear at that point that Swamp Castle was not going to be usable for much longer; I got engineer Beaman Kerman out of the outpost so that I could at least switch craft. What I should've realized was that a Kraken attack was in progress - I should've also got scientist Frovan Kerman and pilot Alder Kerman out of the base while I still had the chance. When I did finally head back to Swamp Castle, well... Beamon beginning a three kilometer hike. Apparently Swamp Castle had burned down, fell over and then sank into the swamp while I wasn't looking. Had to perform some KML necromancy to resurrect Frovan and Alder this morning. The effort to begin building the fifth iteration of the South Base also began... But I digress from my moment of triumph! LSV House Harkonnen leaving the Dystopia Planitia drydock. House Harkonnen left dock with about 1200 m/s of delta-V and enough enriched uranium to run her SAFER reactors, and there was an available supply of Xenon for her Alcubierre drive at the Deepwater Horizon outpost on Minmus sufficient enough to fill her to capacity, so the ship set a maneuver to take her to Minmus and burned using conventional drives. She deployed her Gigantors solar panels and brought the nuke reactors online, and the process of "pump-filling" the drive's exotic matter tanks commenced - basically, once her IFS Capacitor and conventional batteries were fully charged, I'd run the exotic matter generator until the ship was just about out of power, then shut it off and let the system recharge, a cyclical process that takes about 2 minutes and 45 seconds game-time. As of this morning, the ship's got just over 400 units of exotic matter in the tank (capacity is 15,000 units). The plan is to get it at least as far as 750 via pump-filling, which should be enough to run the drive long enough to sun-dive close enough to Kerbol for the Gigantors to really kick in and fully charge the tank. As the replacement contract for Ribsted's rescue did not involve more tourists, it was go-time for the crew of the planned new outpost on Mun, and with both them and Chadsey aboard, Next Objective departed for Mun; she'll arrive in 3.5 hours. Plan for today is to get them to Mun, continue rebuilding the South Base, and continue with pump-filling House Harkonnen. I'm at that point where a third of my contracts are Duna/Ike related, so getting Harkonnen up and running is a top priority, and operations at Kerbin are effectively halted until I can get a surface mass driver rebuilt. I do need to run the numbers to see how much it would take to brute-force the South Base back to the same level of efficacy it had before the Kraken attack. I imagine it won't be cheap. On the other hand, I may not have the time to scratch build two bases at once, either in-game or in RL...

(1.5.1; T-12 days to 1.6.x) With the arrival of the ferry ship Next Objective at space station Minmusport on Friday, my weekend saw a fair amount of activity, including five excursions to Minmus's surface. The first of excursions involved engineers Pamal and Chadul going down to the surface to assist engineer Sulan Kerman, who had gone down several days earlier aboard an SCSS 7 garbage collection lander to retrieve what turned out to be a Hitchhiker Module from Minmus's surface. The three engineers hauled the module about fifty meters across the surface to the SCSS, where Sulan made the final set of attachments via KAS screwdriver. Pamal and Chadul planted flags before returning to Minmusport, while Sulan departed for orbit. When it was determined that it would also take three kerbals to detach the Hitchhiker from the SCSS, the next excursion crew consisting of scientist Wenmy Kerman and engineer Ceri Kerman made a quick detour to assist prior to going to the surface. None of the craft involved could dock to one another, so the order of the day was jet-packing. Ceri jet-packing over from the Spamcan to the SCSS, with Wenmy already in place. Once Ceri and Wenmy were in position, Sulan merely had to get out of the SCSS long enough to cut the module loose. Sulan could've said something before she cut everything loose and dumped Ceri and Wenmy off. But she didn't... Job done, Wenmy and Ceri got back aboard their Spamcan 7 2-passenger monoprop lander, proceeded to the surface, planted flags and returned to Minmusport. Meanwhile, Sulan returned to the Non Mentha orbital shipyards and jet-packed back to her nominal post. Maybe next time I'll add a docking port. And then again, maybe I won't. Its job complete, the SCSS then burned for Kerbin, while Sulan began the printing of a Bill Clinton 7b grabber probe to finish getting the Hitchhiker module the rest of the way to Kerbin. SCSS 7 burning for Kerbin, with NMY in the background. In retrospect, I could've just left the module on the SCSS; you know what they say about hindsight. On the other hand, entry heating might've become a concern had I done that. Anyway, scientist Kathald Kerman and Bill conducted the next excursion; their landing went a little awry and the two of them broke off one of the Spamcan's solar panels at landing. Spamcan returning to Minmusport for the third time near local sunset, sans one solar panel... Other than that, though, the remaining excursions proceeded without incident - Kathald, Bill, pilots Billy-Bobcal, Gregald and Geofbles Kerman and Minmusport scientist Rodemone Kerman all went down, all planted flags and returned to Minmusport safely. After a refueling mass driver shot between Minmusport and the Deepwater Horizon outpost on the surface, Next Objective departed Minmusport and set course for Non Mentha; with scientists Ribsted, Kathald and Wenmy aboard, a final requirement for the presence of three scientists in a new space station over Minmus was fulfilled, netting me √480k. Next Objective then departed for Kerbin. Ceri, Kathald and Geofbles were left at NMY in the event that a new outpost crew was ever required at Minmus. Between the time Next Objective departed the station and broke orbit, printing of the Bill Clinton probe concluded; it was fueled and launched from NMY, setting a rendezvous with the Hitchhiker module. Next Objective then burned, returning to Kerbin 6.5 days later and docking at space station Kerbinport just this morning. Meanwhile, the Clinton captured its target and burned for Kerbin; it encountered Mun on its path back and so wound up getting to Kerbin ahead of Next Objective. Entry and splashdown of the target were affected successfully. The SCSS also entered successfully, with all parts of the craft retrieved intact. Last thing that happened yesterday was the beginning of a Pathfinder Ice Cream experiment; to perform the job, scientist Willin Kerman was loaded aboard a modified Wisent 7 utility rover along with the experimental equipment and a SAFER nuclear reactor. Willin found a reasonable, out-of-the-way kind of spot at which to let the experiment run its course. 'Reserved for Mortimer Kerman', eh? I got a nuclear reactor on this thing (courtesy of your brother Randolph and one dolla bill) sez otherwise... That experiment is expected to conclude in about 33 bols (198 hours). Next on the agenda is the return of Ribsted to the surface. There are currently no return-to-surface craft available at Kerbinport and I do have a tourist contract for a Mun flyby, so I'll probably be conducting an Auk XIII single-passenger spaceplane flight up to Kerbinport today to send up tourist Chadsey Kerman and to send down Ribsted. With my luck, the replacement of Ribsted's rescue contract is liable to be a six-Kerbal tourist mission (knock on wood, actually). Anyway, Next Objective is scheduled to leave for Mun again as soon as possible to deliver Billy-Bobcal, Wenmy, Pamal and Chadul to the Non Caseus Yards over Mun, where a TBD 7b rover is prepped and ready for them to start up a new outpost on Mun. That one's been a while in coming, and I'm looking forward to getting it started as quickly as possible. Construction of the Muad'dib 7-type Alcubierre warp ship LSV House Harkonnen is also nearly complete. While at Minmus, I saw where Deepwater Horizon had managed to refine more Xenon than House Harkonnen would need for full tanks, so the ship's first voyage may very well be under conventional drive. A 6-12 bol trip out to Minmus would provide ample time to try to get the ship's exotic matter tanks filled enough for an outbound warp flight anyway. House Harkonnen is also scheduled to try a little experiment - to print up something in its on-board drydock and see how well it survives the warp (in this case, a module designed to dock back to the ship for the sole purpose of fulfilling the contract to fly-by Duna and return to Kerbin without entering Duna's orbit). By all rights it should work. Won't know until I do it...

Not much accomplished since my last report, but then again since my last report covered two weeks worth of stuff, I don't mind so much. I have a screenie if that helps... (1.5.1) Yesterday afternoon saw the final positioning of the Kerbincomm India communications satellite in its 74-day orbit on the edge of Kerbin's SOI. Kerbincomm Hotel, the final satellite in the Kerbin SOI comms network, still has another 45 days before it reaches final position. Hoping I actually get it in place before I switch over to KSP 1.6 here in a few weeks. With that done, my attention turned to printing of a Muad'dib 7 Alcubierre mothership at the Dystopia Planitia orbital shipyard over Kerbin. Fulfillment of the ship's order required slightly over 20,000 EL RocketParts; the Swamp Castle outpost near KSC had a capacity of just over 5000, so three new Pathfinder Chuckwagon modules were printed up at the base and engineer Beamon Kerman went out to attach them to the base. Unfortunately, the Kraken has long-threatened to eat the base, and chose that moment to strike; all three of the new Chuckwagons blew along with the single RocketParts Chuckwagon already attached to the base as well as one of the dedicated power 'wagons. Fortunately, when I saw the Kraken preparing to strike, I had the good sense to send up the base's entire inventory of RocketParts to DP via mass driver, so no resources were actually lost. It did necessitate a re-start of the game and a reprinting/re-installation of the 'wagons, which was done. The necessary RocketParts were printed and shot up to Dystopia Planitia, and station engineer Dr. Leah Braums......er, Jergar Kerman...began construction; the Muad'dib 7-type craft LSV House Harkonnen is expected to take 10 days, 4 hours and change to complete (the name is in partial homage to my last Alcubierre-drive ship, the Heighliner 7-type craft MSV Fat Man from v. 1.3.1). Meanwhile, rescuee scientist Ribsted Kerman had taken a trip out to the Non Mentha Yards over Minmus the day before, with me having forgotten that the SCSS 7 garbage-retreival craft that station engineer Sulan Kerman had taken down to the surface the day before was only a single-man craft. I got Ribsted back over to space station Minmusport just in time for the arrival of the ferry ship Next Objective, which put into dock at Minmusport shortly thereafter: Next Objective arriving at Minmusport. Next Objective's arrival precipitates an extended series of surface excursions, with all nine Kerbals aboard the craft needing to go to the surface for flag-planting training. After that, the ship will be heading back to Kerbin to drop off a few newly-frocked two-star crewmembers while heading on to the Non Caseus Yards over Mun to drop off the crew of a new Munar outpost. Their craft is ready to go at this point, so that mission will get underway as soon as the crew arrives. While they are there, I can send two other Kerbals down to give Sulan some help; no need to send a rescuee if I can at all help it. Dumb-ass engineer Ceri Kerman might be left at Minmus so that Ribsted can get a lift home (that's not necessarily meant disparagingly - her attributes include "dumb = 0.965911329"). At two-stars experience, Ceri should be a little more useful than she was in the immediate past with running a Pathfinder outpost. Anyway, ten days and I'll have a new warp ship. At that point, I get to face the challenge of fueling it up with exotic matter - those things don't come off the press pre-loaded with fuel, after all. I think I can get to a good position for final full fueling over Kerbol with as little as 200 units of exotic matter. Still going to take a while to generate the prerequisite amount of power, though. Xenon's going to be another fun resource on which to load up, methinks - especially seeing as I have yet to unlock Ion Propulsion...

The latest version of the mod is a few versions old at this point; 1.4.1 unless I'm mistaken. CKAN would look at that and laugh at any attempt to add it condescendingly (since it only lists mods that match the current KSP version, i.e. v. 1.6.0). Alcubierre Drive does work in 1.6.0 from all reports as is, so if you want to use this mod, you're going to have to go for a manual install. Assuming you're running KSP on Windows 10: 1) Go to the very first post of this thread and download the mod from RoverDude's GitHub. Latest version you can get there is 0.10.0.0; there's an extant patch version 0.10.1.0 somewhere but I don't have the link. 2) Once it's downloaded, go to your Downloads directory/library to find the file. Alternatively, you should be able to click something on the downloaded file that will allow you to "Show File Location". Double-click the .zip file to open it, and copy the GameData file from within the zip. 3) Go to the directory from which you run KSP (on my computer, it's C:/Kerbal Space Program). Paste it in. You won't be overwriting anything in the GameData directory. 4) To verify the install, go into the GameData directory. If you see a directory called "UmbraSpaceIndustries", you're good. If you see one called "GameData" (i.e. another GameData directory within the GameData directory), something fouled. Try that and see if it works.

Happy New Year, y'all! I hope y'all had a pleasant holiday season, and that you, like me, found at least some time to Kerbal. At this point my log is two weeks long, so I figured it was high time to give y'all a report. I'll do my best to keep it brief, but there's a lot of ground to cover. Earliest entry in my log comes from December 21st, a day which began with refueling mass driver shots between the Swamp Castle outpost near KSC and the orbiting space station Kerbinport. An Auk IX 4-passenger spaceplane that had departed Kerbinport the day before landed safely at KSC 09 with engineer Sulan Kerman and tourists Marus and Sarah Kerman aboard, fulfilling Sulan's rescue contract. Sulan was immediately loaded aboard an Auk XII 6-passenger spaceplane and flew back to Kerbinport, embarking aboard the ferry ship Strange Cargo docked at the station upon her arrival. Strange Cargo then departed Kerbinport with Jeb at the helm along with Sulan, Val and tourists Derble, Rado, Phobrett and Anger Kerman aboard; the ship wouldn't arrive at Minmus until December 26th. meanwhile a new probe core for the nearby Wisent 7a utility rover was printed up at the Piper Alpha outpost on Mun; once installed, the rover was sent on an attempt to fulfill a 5-waypoint temperature survey mission 50 kilometers to the west of Piper Alpha, with three of those waypoints in flight. The rover completed the job at two of the waypoints but crashed during the landing attempt on its way to the third waypoint. The remains of the Wisent post-crash. Could've been worse. Could've cost me money... Having not quicksaved ahead of time, I decided I'd finish up the survey later. In the meantime, construction of the Dystopia Planitia 7 orbital shipyard I at Piper Alpha was completed and the new outpost was launched to a 25 kilometer equatorial orbit of Mun. Upon reaching its final orbit, the station was christened as the Non Caseus Yards. The new outpost's first job was the printing of a Stevie Wonder 7 solar observatory, which owing to the fact that NCY was launched un-crewed delayed production. Back at Piper Alpha, a fresh Mosquito 7 ground survey probe-lander was printed up in a further attempt to find a suitable location for a new Mun base (read suitable as: has all of the prerequisite resources necessary to print up Pathfinder Equipment on site using the fastest available method). The Mosquito hit the Highland Craters, Poles, Polar Lowlands, Southwest Crater and Northeast Basin successfully, crashing out during an attempt to land at the Polar Crater (in which I was still able to get the readings I wanted). None of those biomes proved suitable. Yet another Mosquito was printed at PA on December 22nd and I hit the remaining biomes, ultimately discovering that no single Mun biome would be suitable for a Mun base; having encountered this phenomenon already (kinda) with the Deepwater Horizon outpost on Minmus, my thoughts turned to possibly putting the base near a biome boundary. I had a couple of outstanding surveys to complete on Mun, so I finished up my day on the 22nd with the printing of a venerable Hellhound 7 rover along with its skycrane at Piper Alpha. Meanwhile, the existing Hound near the Armstrong Memorial was dispatched to check the boundary region between the Northwest Crater and the surrounding Midlands. While the corresponding area did have the necessary mix of resources, the terrain was slightly uncooperative in the surveyed region. If any of y'all ever wonder why I still use a rover I designed all the way back in v0.18 - something going on six years old now - this sort of thing is why. The edges of those big craters are no joke... On the 23rd, the new Hellhound finished printing and flew to a survey site on Mun 200 kilometers east of Piper Alpha, hitting all three waypoints of a seismic survey successfully. An ore con job took place between Piper Alpha, Swamp Castle and Kerbinport for money, after which I began a pair of Pathfinder science experiments, one at Deepwater Horizon and the other at Piper Alpha. PA's scientist didn't have the necessary chutzpah to begin the experiment on his own, so to that end I designed and printed up the Venkmann 7 science probe-lander at Piper Alpha, flying it just off the base's launch pad to conduct the experiment. (Yes, I misspelled it - there's only one 'n' in the name. Oh well). A new Hellhound was printed up at Piper Alpha on Christmas Eve; the rover conducted a survey of a promising boundary area near the Mun's Northeast Basin; alas, that turned out to be a wash. A Spamcan 7a 4-kerbal lander was also printed up at Piper Alpha. Once it was complete, engineers Ceri and Gemlorf Kerman went up to the Non Caseus Yards to begin production of the Stevie Wonder telescope. Ceri proved to be as detrimental to production at NCY as she had been at PA, so she was dispatched to go pick up scientist Roddon Kerman at space station Munport on Christmas Day. The two kerbals traded positions upon the Spamcan's arrival and Roddon went to NCY, leaving Ceri in operational command of Munport. Once the telescope was completed, Roddon boarded the new craft, fuel was shot up and the telescope launched on a mission to conduct a Pathfinder Gravioli wave experiment. The Non Caseus Yards with the Stevie Wonder telescope ready for launch in its drydock. Shortly thereafter, construction of the Non Mentha Yards was completed at Deepwater Horizon; the new outpost launched into a 22 kilometer low orbit over Minmus with rescuee engineer Nadard Kerman aboard. NMY at launch. This is probably the first good pic I've got of a launch from Deepwater Horizon to boot... Rigs for contracts at Mun and Minmus were designed, with construction beginning at Non Caseus and Non Mentha, respectively. NCY had a simple parts testing rig to build; the test was a success and the rig was subsequently sent to crash into Mun. NMY, on the other hand, was being utilized to fulfill a contract to put a new station over Minmus; its rig consisted of the additional facilities required and a docking rig. While construction of this rig was underway, Strange Cargo arrived at space station Minmusport. The Spamcan 7 2-person monoprop lander at DH was sent up to Minmusport after refueling and docked successfully, at which time Sulan joined Nadard aboard NMY. The two of them finished printing the new module together, and after it was docked to the outpost, construction of a Ray Charles 7 telescope commenced; the telescope would be given the task of completing an asteroid mapping contract, looking for Class E rocks threatening Kerbin. Construction of the telescope was completed on December 27th, at which point it was fueled, launched from NMY and burned to the target periapsis over Kerbol - it won't arrive for another 217 days. Ray Charles telescope burning over Minmus on a Kerbin escape trajectory. In the meantime, yet another Hellhound rover was printed up at Piper Alpha, and another ore con job took place. Construction of a McFeely 7 science speedy delivery probe lander commenced at Deepwater Horizon anticipating the completion of a Pathfinder experiment there; said experiment finished up in rapid order and the probe launched from DH. And a speedy delivery to you too...last screenie for today, sadly. The probe arrived with the experiment safely at Kerbin on December 29th. Meanwhile, with their principal tasks completed, Nadard departed NMY for Minmusport, boarding Strange Cargo upon her arrival. Two excursions to the surface then took place, with Jeb and Val planting flags and tourists Rado and Derble going for a quick jaunt to the surface. Once they returned and with the ship's business at Minmus completed, Strange Cargo departed and burned to return to Kerbin. The three extant Hellhound rovers on the Mun's surface were designated as Rogues 1-3, and upon its completion, the new Hound was designated as Rogue 4, which was then launched to finish up the temperature survey the Wisent had failed to complete; the new rover completed the mission successfully. December 27th finished up with another Minmus ore con job and construction commencing of a G-LOC 7 1-kerbal return-to-Kerbin craft at the Dystopia Planitia Yards over Kerbin, with a job to return Bill to the surface. A new crew for the upcoming Mun outpost - pilot Billy-Bobcal Kerman, scientist Wenmy Kerman and engineers Chadul and Pamal Kerman - was also hired. Not much happened on the 28th - a new variant of the TBD 7 rover was designed, with emphasis on being able to establish a pair of distributed bases for the upcoming Mun mission. Satisfied that the new design would work properly, construction of the new design commenced at NCY. On the 29th, the fifth Mun Hellhound rover - Rogue 5 - was constructed at Piper Alpha and sent to another potential outpost site along a boundary between the Munar Midlands and Highlands along the equator. This time I hit pay-dirt; the boundary zone had the necessary resources between the two nearby biomes along with flat areas within physics range of one another. Printing of the G-LOC completed at Dystopia Planitia and Bill affected a safe return to the surface. A new Superfortress 7 ferry craft - dubbed Next Objective - was launched from KSC with Billy-Bobcal at the helm along with Pamal, Chadul, Wenmy, Bill, scientist Kathald Kerman and pilots Gregald and Geofbles aboard, on a flag-planting training mission. The ship's first port-of-call after launch was Munport; after arriving, Ceri was picked up and the eight other staff aboard conducted a pair of surface excursions for training. After everyone was back aboard and the craft was refueled, Next Objective departed for Kerbin, where a 65 m/s slingshot maneuver took place to send the craft on to Minmus. The day ended with the return of the McFeely 7 fron Minmus, successfully completing the required contract. Refueling mass driver shots took place between Piper Alpha and Munport on the 30th. New Year's Eve began with the completion of the TBD 7b at NCY, with the necessary mass driver shots to tool-up the base-seeding rover shortly thereafter. The Venkmann probe on Mun completed its mission and launched for Kerbin, making a successful splashdown and fulfilling its contract. Strange Cargo returned to Kerbinport from its jaunt to Minmus, and Jeb transferred to a Minnow 7 ferry craft docked at the station to go pick up scientist Willin Kerman and bring him back to the station. After Jeb returned, Willin, Nadard, Derble, Rado and Phobrett boarded the waiting Auk XII still docked at the station and returned safely to KSC 09, fulfilling four contracts and bringing 2018 to a satisfying conclusion. This past Wednesday was a bit trying. A new Venkmann probe design meant solely for return from LKO - the Venkmann 7a - was printed up at Dystopia Planitia and launched but didn't have any ResearchKits aboard, requiring the probe to be scrapped and a new one to be printed up. Printing of an adequate supply of Kits began but didn't finish up until a few RL hours ago. An SCSS 7 garbage collection lander was printed up at NMY and Sulan went down in the new ship to pick up the target - which turned out to be a Hitchhiker Module; at 2.5 tonnes, she'll need help before she can lift that garbage off Minmus's surface. Two kerbal scientists are in orbit right now and I'll be taking steps to send them that way at the next opportunity. Printing of a NERVA engine testing rig at DH took place and the test was successful, and while the subsequent dismantling of the rig went largely according to plan, it took a bit longer than anticipated. Another ore con took place and scientist Ribsted Kerman was safely rescued from Minmus's lowlands. Yesterday and for the better part of today, I decided the time had come to revisit the design of my old Heighliner 7 Alcubierre drive tug. After analyzing the old ship, I made functional changes that would change it from a dedicated tug to a full-blown mothership (in the Homeworld sense) - a warp-capable ship capable of printing up new craft in-situ. I also rectified a few of the Heighliner's shortcomings, adding a dedicated set of more powerful engines and removing docking ports in areas that proved cumbersome. The new ship - dubbed the Muad'dib 7 - conducted an 11-day test flight to Duna yesterday using the slow transit method, proving the design works. After resetting the save this morning, a Dystopia Planitia 7 craft was launched in my litterbox save and a Muad'dib craft was printed successfully, where tests were conducted to check to see if a sufficient amount of exotic matter could be generated to power the warp drive while still in orbit of Kerbin. The test was a success and the craft has been transferred over to my career save for operational use. Printing of additional storage units for the necessary RocketParts commenced at Swamp Castle, and in the meantime the Research Kits were shot up to the new Venkmann probe at Dystopia Planitia. The probe was launched and began its scientific mission; it should complete it in about sixteen days. Well, that was longer than I'd hoped. TL, DR: I did a bunch of stuff involving the Pathfinder, Extraplanetary Launchpads and Alcubierre Drive mods that was pretty cool. At least it was to me anyway...

Experienced something last night that I felt worth reporting - using Alcubierre Drive v. 0.10.1.0 with KSP 1.5.1. It's been a while since I've flown an Alcubierre ship, so I figured I should send one up to see if I remembered what I was doing. No problems navigating with the drive, but I was able to get all the way to failsafe altitude over Duna without the braking code kicking in; it was fortunate that the craft was pointed away from Duna at the time, I suppose. I did experience the drive slowing down over Kerbol as normal, so this may just have been a fluke. I'll try another planet and see if it happens again. Log file, if it's remotely helpful.

Some old, but still very much applicable advice that might be helpful to you. If you can get ahold of it early, it doesn't take much delta-V to raise the periapsis. 50,000-47,500 m should be low enough to get you an aero-capture without blowing anything up (I say that; quicksave first). Rock's going to weigh 191 tonnes at most, probably less than that. A J64 with a Skipper will give you roughly 500 m/s of delta-V, more than enough for a stable capture.

Konkrete is dependent on the mode of the mod you're using. Water, Slag and Power are required in Classic Stock and CRP. In Classic Stock, Minerite is also needed, while in CRP it's Minerals. The Brew Works is the facility that produces it either way. Konkrete production needs this - 1. A base with a positive productivity rating. This means smart and/or experienced kerbals placed in inflatable modules suited to their specialties (scientists in Docs, engineers in Haciendas, pilots generally out of the way somewhere...seriously, I haven't determined where they go just yet. Casas maybe). 2. One storage unit for Minerals and one for Slag, or an OmniStorage unit handling both. Without these, you won't be getting either resource (and therefore no Konkrete). I recommend a Chuckwagon(s). 3. At least one Brew Works (obviously). Multiple units in use at one time will increase the rate at which you produce Konkrete; in practice I've never had more than 2 Brew Works going at my bases. You'll also want at least one Claim Jumper. You'll want its Prospector unit turned on (which generates Slag as a by-product provided you have positive vessel productivity; as best I can tell the Claim Jumper's drills make Minerals/Minerite on their own, which reminds me...) 3A. The Prospector unit on a Geology Lab will also fill the bill. Just saying. 4. A site with a Minerals/Minerite content of not zero. Can't stress that one enough. 5. At least one storage unit for Konkrete (again, I recommend Chuckwagons). If your goal is sufficient Konkrete for a Castillo, you'll need 3-4 Chuckwagons dedicated solely to Konkrete.

You can find this information in the configuration files; it doesn't vary between modes of the mod unless I'm very much mistaken. Here's a rundown: Caveat here is that this information is for Pathfinder 1.31.1.0, which is not the latest version. I'm still using 1.5.1 at the moment pending mod updates, which is why I have yet to switch. Also bear in mind that if you configure a module in the VAB/SPH ahead of time, you just have to worry about the inflation cost of the module. If you print them up on site, you have to inflate it at the rate of the default configuration for the facility, and then change it for the cost of the configuration you want. Building a new Claimjumper on site therefore has the highest overall Equipment cost of any of the inflatable modules. Finally, the productivity rating of your base will affect the cost (either that or the experience level of your engineers; it's hard to tell because the two strongly correlate to one another). A higher productivity rating will reduce the cost more effectively.

It's a converter in the Doc/Watney; should be the case no matter what mode of the mod you're using. Needs Ore and EC to work, so you'll have to hook up a Gold Digger, Claimjumper, Buffalo Drill or stock drill to your base as well (Claimjumper works best in my experience but go with whatever works for you).

Yeah. I think the point I was trying to convey in that post was to not rely on the OPAL for producing those resources with any measure of speed.

Glad to have been of some assistance. OPAL does produce Slag, but as I said earlier, the rate is atrocious. From the CRP config file - INPUT_RESOURCE { ResourceName = ElectricCharge Ratio = 15 } INPUT_RESOURCE { ResourceName = Ore Ratio = 0.0014 } OUTPUT_RESOURCE { ResourceName = Water Ratio = 0.000357 } OUTPUT_RESOURCE { ResourceName = Waste Ratio = 0.00001 } OUTPUT_RESOURCE { ResourceName = Slag Ratio = 0.00001 } OUTPUT_RESOURCE { ResourceName = Oxygen Ratio = 0.000115 DumpExcess = true } Those rates are per second. At a rate of .00001 Slag output, you'd produce a measurable amount of Slag (0.01 units) after 16 minutes and 40 seconds. OPAL doesn't store Slag on its own - you do need a Chuckwagon to hold it. A operating Prospector unit - either at a Geology Lab or Claimjumper - will produce it much faster, but in order to do so, the productivity of your base needs to be a value above zero; figured that one out not too long ago my own self. Productivity is largely dependent on the stupidity rating of your individual Kerbals and their experience levels. Had an 81% stupid pilot go on EVA; base's efficiency jumped six points. Replaced a 13% stupid one-star engineer with an 18% stupid 2-star engineer; productivity went up three points. So take from that what you will. I can't say I'm seeing the same behavior as you with the Geology Lab and Claimjumper; I have the option to manage operations from both. Would you mind taking a screenie with the menu open? Just want to know exactly what you're seeing. For the record, here's what I'm seeing. I have my Prospector shut off at the moment, which is why Slag isn't being produced in the screenies (the Prospector cuts into your ore and this base isn't making all that much to begin with). Been trying to work on the issue of making an Oxygen storage template my own self recently. I was going to report failure in that regard but I just realized the file had the wrong extension (it had saved as a .txt file instead of a .cfg file; I appear to be the king of noob mistakes lately). Try this - STORAGE_TEMPLATE { name = Oxygen author = Angel-125 shortName = Oxygen logoPanel = WildBlueIndustries/000WildBlueTools/Decals/Oxium glowPanel = WildBlueIndustries/000WildBlueTools/Decals/OxiumGlow description = This kit stores Oxygen for your general not-deadness. templateTags = stowage RESOURCE { name = Oxygen amount = 1800 maxAmount = 1800 } } Save it as Oxygen.cfg in WildBlueIndustries\000WildBlueTools\Templates\CRP\Storage, and see what that gets you. Me, I need to see if this is actually working. If it doesn't, I'll say something about it on the quick-fast... As a workaround, try the TAC Fuel Balancer mod; you can set it to dump the oxygen while you're still working at your base (assuming you're not using any life support mods - otherwise that's probably not the best advice). Hasn't been updated for a while but it still works (at least in 1.5.1 it does; can't vouch for 1.6). EDIT: Yep, the config file works. It does help when you put it in the right subdirectory; I originally had it in Templates\Common\Storage and my game was hanging as a result...

Nope - it's from Pathfinder. Specifically it's the Rangeland extraplanetary launchpad, and if you have the Extraplanetary Launchpads mod installed as well, it lets the base function as a remote construction/launch site as well. it's pretty nifty. Well, 1.6 dropped yesterday (as I'm sure most of you are aware by now). Can't say I'm happy about that; I waited a full month after 1.5 dropped before switching over, and that was just over one month ago. I was still expecting to have another month in 1.5.x, honestly. Means the thirty day countdown has begun and I'll have to decide whether or not to start afresh (as is traditional for me) or continue my current career save. Given that I've just now gotten my Kerbin SOI infrastructure set up, I'll probably have to continue, which is a shame - the early game really is the most fun part, IMHO. Also means I'm going to have to start tagging my posts with "1.5.1" for the next month. Ugh. Anyways... </rant> Screenie-less day for y'all, I'm afraid. After printing up the necessary RocketParts to do so, construction of a Dystopia Planitia 7 orbital shipyard commenced at the Deepwater Horizon outpost on Minmus. Construction is scheduled to take two whole weeks to complete. Castillo modules were installed at both Deepwater Horizon and the Piper Alpha outpost on Mun, effectively bringing principal construction of the two outposts to completion (finally). Definitely have learned a lot about the inner working of the Pathfinder mod in the process; I'm hoping I can apply that knowledge to help those out there who, like me, have dealt with some frustration with its mechanics. So with that done, it was time to get back to business. After departing space station Kerbinport, the ferry ship Strange Cargo made a burn for Mun with Jeb, Val, engineer Haydorf Kerman and tourists Derble, Marus, Sarah, Rado, Phobrett and Anger Kerman aboard. The craft arrived in the Mun's SOI 3 hours and 40 minutes later and then affected docking at space station Munport. Pipeline shots between Piper Alpha and Munport occurred to refuel Strange Cargo, after which Sarah, Anger and Phobrett visited the surface in the station's Spamcan 7a lander. The lander returned to Munport with the tourists, after which Jeb, Val and Haydorf made their way down to Piper Alpha. The three Kerbals planted some temporary flags on Mun so they could punch their experience tickets, and then Haydorf joined the staff at Piper Alpha, replacing engineer Sulan Kerman (who herself is the subject of an as-yet-unfulfilled rescue contract). Sulan's final task at Piper Alpha was to install a KAS resource transfer station, which was used to refuel the Spamcan for return to Munport. Sulan, Jeb and Val then returned to Munport. Haydorf punched her ticket at PA, raising her to two-star experience and causing a large boost in the outpost's overall productivity rating (which was the plan - something I'm quite happy about). Once the three returned, all tourists and staff re-boarded Strange Cargo and the craft departed, burning for Kerbin. Successfully docking at Kerbinport was acheived this morning and Sulan, Marus and Sarah boarded a waiting Auk IX 4-passenger spaceplane also docked at the station. The plane has undocked and will conduct its deorbiting burn to land at KSC in about another one-third of an orbit. Another Pipeline shot between Piper Alpha and Munport took place as well, this time refueling the Spamcan. Nothing else happened yesterday except for a test to see if I'd created a working template for Oxygen storage with Pathfinder, involving the installation of a new warehouse at the Swamp Castle outpost near KSC. The test was unsuccessful, and I'll be taking steps to see just what went wrong at the next opportunity. Meanwhile that warehouse is working as spare electrical charge storage for the outpost. Pretty slow day overall, honestly.

#noob_mistake #facepalm_so_hard_it_is_felt_in_abu_dhabi It would certainly help matters if I equipped the stupid KIS screwdriver, wouldn't it... Then, follow the directions the mod's creator has given to me kindly (and repeatedly), and then... Piper Alpha at Mun. Deepwater Horizon at Minmus. Both screenies are as of about ten minutes ago. I feel like an idiot (and probably rightly so). Thanks for putting up with it, and thanks for your help.

Did/doing that. What do I attach it to?

I don't mean to be dense, but I still can't seem to figure this out... I don't see any KIS nodes to attach it to, no matter which way I rotate it. #confused_(hopefully)_obviously Is the intent to build the Castillo as the first structure at a base and then attach other things to it? I've got the opposite going on - a full base already made out of Pondarosas/Casa, Chuckwagons, Docs and Haciendas, to which I want to attach a Castillo. Maybe I'm just doing things backwards...

Compared to the last several days, yesterday was relatively uneventful. It began with the remote launch of a Glass Cannon 7 orbital mass driver module from the Deepwater Horizon outpost on Minmus, which was destined to dock with space station Minmusport in orbit. Man, it looks like there's a lot of crap on the ground in the area...I should go out and clean all that up... The module arrived and docked successfully at the station. I discovered that, despite my protestations to the contrary yesterday, I could indeed operate the module's SAFER reactors on enriched uranium alone. Dual mode reactor, it turns out. I still can't make nuclear fuel for a refill but at least this way I can give the station the additional power it needs to run it during the nighttime hours, so I should be able to make mass driver shots at Minmus now. With both the Glass Cannon modules in place at their respective space stations, my focus turned to the construction of orbital shipyards over Mun and Minmus. I discovered that the printing of a Dystopia Planitia 7 yard with a Mun surface-to-orbit booster would take more Rocket Parts than either Deepwater Horizon or the Piper Alpha outpost on Mun had the capacity for, so I went ahead and printed up a trio of additional warehouses at both bases and attached them successfully, and began in-situ RP manufacturing. While that was ongoing, I printed up a Mosquito 7 probe lander at Piper Alpha. Ah, night screenies. Always great at showing everything except for what it was you wanted to show off in the first place. The Mosquito was designed with one purpose in mind - to conduct surface scans of the various Mun biomes in order to find one where I didn't have to cheat to build another Pathfinder outpost on Mun. The Mosquito landed in the Highlands, Midland Craters and East Farside Crater, all of which turned up negative for suitability (which in this case means 'suitable to make Equipment on site using a Pathfinder foundry', or the presence of both Exotic Minerals and Rare Metals in the same biome). An attempt to land in the Canyons this morning went awry and the probe was destroyed at that point, so another one will have to be printed up in the near future. Seven biomes have been scanned in total on Mun - so far none are suitable. Once the Mosquito had finished printing, I had the RP necessary to begin the construction of the Mun Dystopia Planitia station; it will finish up in six days. I still have to figure out a plan for staffing the outpost once it's built. Once it's up, I intend to construct a Stevie Wonder 7 solar telescope in orbit in order to conduct a specific experiment for which I have a contract. Again, staffing of the telescope will be a concern. In other news, pilot Gregald Kerman returned from the Mun safely aboard the G-LOC 7 RTK craft printed at Piper Alpha, and engineer Haydorf Kerman was retrieved safely from Minmus's orbit using the Bill Clinton 7b grabber probe built at DH. Haydorf along with tourists Derble and Marus Kerman were then promptly sent to space station Kerbinport aboard an Auk IX 4-passenger spaceplane, docking there safely this morning. The three Kerbals transferred to Strange Cargo docked at the station (eventually - apparently I had reverted a quicksave that undid the ship's docking a few days ago; had to go get it docked this morning) along with Jeb (who took operational command), Val and tourists Sarah, Rado, Anger and Phobrett. At that point, Strange Cargo undocked from the station and a trans-Munar burn maneuver was set up. The ship will make that burn in a little over twenty minutes from now. Today I hope to begin printing up the Dystopia Planitia over Minmus leading to a launch, finish major construction of/at Piper Alpha, and send Jeb and company on to Mun. I also need to print up a new Mosquito. Hoping to clear some long-standing contracts in the near future.

Okay. And which file(s) needs to be adjusted? Just double-checking so I don't screw something up. I'll try the KIS nodes again...got 'em figured out on the inflatable parts. Boxed parts not yet, obviously.

Alright, I need to ask some questions about the Castillo. The first thing I was going to ask is what happened to the templates, but then I searched for the term "Castillo" on this thread and saw the Guy Fawke's Day release notes for 1.31.0.0 that said they'd all been rolled into a single template. Which is pretty sweet, actually, since now I only have to print up one of them instead of three to get the functionality of each. Do Castillos still have an effect on overall base productivity if you've got a Pilot in them? I'm afraid I do still need a tutorial on how to attach Castillos to KIS nodes (referencing this post from November 30th here); I couldn't figure out how to do it last night when I went to build the one at my new Minmus base. Wound up attaching it with Mineshafts, which is kinduva no-no at this point. I have two more printed up and the resources available to deploy another one, so I can try again if anyone's willing to walk me through the process. Last question, this one related to Chuckwagons. Maybe I've missed it somewhere, but how hard is it (or is it even possible) to add a specific storage template? Looking specifically to do Oxygen in CRP mode - it's a pain to have to dump it out every time I want to enrich more uranium...

I still don't understand angular momentum mode or (more importantly) how to maneuver with it (but then again, rotational physics in general has always kind of baffled me). I haven't tried it out since y'all fixed that bug with it a version or two back. I forget - when you warp in angular momentum mode, your velocity vector doesn't change (just like velocity mode), right? Which means you can maneuver your craft so that its course can point directly towards or away from a planet, right? Or have I misunderstood something?

Yesterday began with the design of a single-Kerbal launch and recovery craft, with the intention of launch from Mun; the craft was ultimately dubbed G-LOC 7. One of these craft was printed up and launched from the Piper Alpha outpost on Mun by the end of the day, with pilot Gregald Kerman on his way back toward Kerbin; he'll arrive in a few hours. In between, I added a new warehouse for Rocket Parts to Piper Alpha and began the preparation of a Glass Cannon 7 orbital mass driver module for space station Munport. After three days of construction, the module was ready and affected a successful launch. Glass Cannon 7 at launch. Adding those SAFER reactors, as it turns out, doesn't do me a lick of good - they don't work without nuclear fuel, which I can't manufacture off Kerbin apparently... The module arrived and docked successfully at Munport later in the day. The attached transfer stage was sent on a trajectory to take it to Kerbin; I'm hoping to be able to recover it and gain a little cash from the parts. Construction of a similar module for space station Minmusport commenced at the Deepwater Horizon outpost on Minmus; this was before I'd discovered that the SAFER reactors were going to be unusable, unfortunately. I may have some power supply issues with using the modules; if so, I'll deal with correcting that when I can. Nothing that can't be done the old-fashioned way... Deepwater Horizon also printed up a Bill Clinton 7b grabber probe and launched the craft to rendezvous with Haydorf's debris in a high, inclined orbit over Minmus. Affecting a rendezvous turned out to be a simple affair, and at this point the probe has the craft (a Pathfinder Spyglass module) and engineer Haydorf in tow and heading towards Kerbin; it should affect entry in four days time. After some more design work (I built a surface sampler probe dubbed Mosquito 7 to take surface biome readings on Mun and Minmus - will be printing some up as soon as the workload will allow it), Bill signaled that construction of the Superfortress 7 passenger ferry Strange Cargo was complete, so it was time to head over to the Dystopia Planitia orbital shipyard for the launch. I don't know what exactly I realized here - either the Superfortress design isn't as big as I thought it was or that drydock can handle some truly massive works... After the docking clamps were released and the ship was under power, I noticed that I had one slight problem... Strange Cargo, clear and under-powered...under-fueled too, apparently...... Instead of hitting the buttons in TAC to transfer fuel to the ship, I had hit the button to dump the fuel. Which might've been an issue, except that the monoprop transfer had gone smoothly enough and Dystopia Planitia had a docking port compatible with Strange Cargo. I maneuvered the ship to the docking port, linked up and shot more fuel up from the Swamp Castle outpost near KSC via the Pipeline mass driver network. After ensuring that she was fueled, Strange Cargo finally headed out for delivery to space station Kerbinport. Little bit of a flub in the grand launch; hoping that's not a sign of things to come for this, the fourth Superfortress 7 craft to bear the name Strange Cargo... The craft arrived and docked successfully, and what resources she had used in the transfer were re-fueled from the Minnow 7 craft already docked at the station. I'm awaiting Heydorf's retreival from Minmus at this point; once she's recovered, she will go up to Kerbinport along with tourists Derble and Marus Kerman via spaceplane, joining Jeb, Val and tourists Sarah, Rado, Anger and Phobrett Kerman already at the station, at which point Strange Cargo's maiden voyage will commence. The ship is scheduled to do a tour of both of Kerbin's moons, affecting tourist landings at both. The intent is to have Heydorf replace engineer Sulan Kerman, another rescuee, at Piper Alpha. Strange Cargo will then return to Kerbinport and Sulan, who will return to the surface just long enough to get the contract ticket punched, after which she'll head back up and Strange Cargo will depart for Minmus. Sulan will be replacing engineer Nadard Kerman - yet another rescued engineer - at Deepwater Horizon. I'm hoping that by shuffling in some two-star engineers to these various outposts I'll boost their productivity values substantially. Plus contracts. Contracts are good. Money is good. Last thing that happened yesterday was the construction of the first Castillo module at Deepwater Horizon. I need to find out about some of the changes that have been made to the Castillo since it was called the Hogan; it may be that it will be the only one of those modules that will be built at DH, and if that's the case, construction of the outpost is effectively 100% complete as of this morning and I can recycle the other two I intended to build there. Did note a three point drop in the outpost's productivity once the Castillo was in place; still don't know what happened there, but I'd like to bring that number back up...

Yesterday saw continued expansion of the Deepwater Horizon Pathfinder outpost on Minmus, with all of the remaining structures I intend to add to the outpost printed up; by the end of the day yesterday, the outpost had reached parity with the Piper Alpha outpost on Mun, including the installation of a Rangeland extraplanetary launchpad and a Pipeline mass driver. Both outposts at this point are focusing on konkrete production to start putting up the permanent Castillo modules, at which point I hope to start getting some colonization contracts. The addition of an antenna and docking port at Deepwater Horizon qualified the base for an outpost contract I had as well, which was pretty nice. After doing some reading up on how productivity values are calculated - it's a feature of the Extraplanetary Launchpads mod that Pathfinder uses as well - I did some rearranging of the personnel at both outposts, moving them into different modules more in line with their areas of expertise. While Deepwater Horizon saw a modest gain from doing this, it was Piper Alpha that saw the biggest jump in productivity, going from -2.7 to a rating of 4.16. It did mean that pilot Gregald Kerman had to go sleep in the Wisent 7a rover parked by the station (him going on EVA jumped the productivity rating by four points), but now the base is making Slag and, more to the point, the Rangeland there finally works like it's supposed to - printing of a Spamcan 7a lander for space station Munport commenced at that point, and before the day was out the new home-grown lander had arrived at Munport. I'll be making arrangements to return Gregald to Kerbin soon, seeing as he's not needed at PA. Meantime I've got some good notes for folks having the same sort of issues with the Pathfinder mod. I put the Rangeland at Deepwater Horizon to work with the printing of a Blip-Blip 7 probe, with the goal of putting a new probe in a high, inclined, retrograde orbit over Minmus; this probe was actually completed before PA's Spamcan, and became the first thing I launched in the current career save from a location other than KSC. Launching stuff without having to make a huge booster for it rules... Unfortunately, after re-reading the contract, I discovered that it was for Mun, not Minmus - a hell of a mistake to make, to be sure. Since I had the probe already up, though, and since it definitely had enough delta-V to do the job, I went ahead and sent it on towards Mun anyway; it should arrive in Mun's SOI in about ten days. With two extraplanetary launchpads in place, I figured the time had come to give the design of an orbital drydock a try, and to that end I designed the Dystopia Planitia 7. A prototype craft was launched with Bill aboard; that craft was reverted when the initial design didn't have a suitably high productivity rating. A MOLE workshop was added to the design and a second craft was launched with pilot Rodhat Kerman and engineer Jergat Kerman joining Bill. The second craft arrived safely in an 80 kilometer equatorial LKO, at which point the two engineers got to work. Dystopia Planitia 7 - not much more than a cupola, a MOLE workshop, a container for Rocket Parts and an orbital mass driver. That and the freakin' huge drydock on top of everything... With the drydock in place, the figures for the orbital construction of a Superfortress 7 ferry craft were obtained and the necessary resources were shot up to Dystopia Planitia from the Swamp Castle outpost near KSC, at which point construction commenced. In three days time, the first Superfortress of this career save - Strange Cargo - will be ready to delivery to the nascent fleet. I hoping to have a nice screenie of the launch in the next few days for y'all... Plans are also currently in the works to print up Glass Cannon 7 orbital mass driver modules for inclusion at space stations Munport and Minmusport; once those are in place, I should have all the infrastructure in place to begin a budding tourist industry in Kerbin's SOI, not to mention get back to doing things that'll earn me money. The goal at that point will be to build an Alcubierre Drive ship. If I ultimately choose to build that in orbit, I foresee one huge problem to overcome - the Exotic Matter required to power the drive. It takes a LOT of Electrical Charge to generate it and the only thing that will generate it is an Alcubierre Drive, so orbital construction may prove to be more of a hassle than it's worth. I'm still considering my options here. In more mundane matters, I finally put a Boop-Boop 7 probe into a high, retrograde, inclined orbit over Kerbin after 18 days of flight. It's about the only other thing that got accomplished yesterday.

It's also from Pathfinder (specifically it's the Rangeland Extraplanetary Launchpad). I agree that it's a complex mod, but once you get used to how things work its actually pretty fun (the mod's wiki is out of date at the moment, which doesn't help matters - though an update is on Angel-125's to-do list once the mod is feature-complete). It's also wound up being a lot cheaper in terms of gameplay - my old refinery design cost up around √1.2M to launch; that base came in at just over √300k, with a lot of it printed in-situ. Also has a substantially lower part count.