KSK

Paging Dr Streetmentioner?

Thanks - and that is an excellent question about kerblet schooling! I’m currently on holiday in the middle of nowhere, so my internet access isn’t great (am writing this standing by the cottage window in the one place that I can get a single bar of 3G signal ), so it may be a few days before I can post a proper answer. But a proper answer you will get!

Farewell Dragon 1. Ten great years and a bunch of milestones racked up, culminating in the 50th booster landing. A pretty damn good swan song I'd say. Rock on Dragon 2 and all who fly her!

Mün or bust?

It's all about the moichandising...

How many pucks would a woodchuck shuck, if a woodchuck could shuck pucks? None - you don’t shuck the puck cos that would suck.

Here you go. Plenty of fanon foodstuffs to get stuck into. Although I'm liking @kerbiloid's sushi and very-alien-palette ideas!

Thanks! I’ve made a start on the next chapter - and I always find starting to be the hardest part.

Yup - and consistency can really help that worldbuilding as well. As a writer I’ve found that figuring out the consequences of the rules you’ve already established can be an incredibly useful way of figuring out where the story goes. Incidentally your last few comments are why I’m not particularly excited about interstellar flight in KSP2. One of the reasons, in fact the main reason, that I liked KSP is that it’s spaceflight as we know it, albeit with a considerable amount of abstraction and some exaggeratedly effective parts (reaction wheels, ion thrusters, solar panels) included for gameplay balance. The near future elements have real life counterparts that have either been thoroughly proven on the ground (LV-Ns) or have met a key development milestone that suggests that the whole concept could work (RAPIER). KSP2 is far more of a science-fiction game and so - for me - loses much of that ‘spaceflight as we know it’ charm. As you point out, it’s also going to require some liberties to be taken, which personally I’m finding a bit hard to swallow. TL:DR It’s science fiction anyway, so dismissing an idea out of hand as ‘purely in the realms of science fiction’ is amusing. Dismissing the idea because it doesn’t fit with the rest of the game would be more reasonable. And actually I think that either an Alcubierre Drive (especially a non superluminal one) or an alien wormhole jumpgate would work quite well. The first is just one more sci-fi engine to add to the pile (unless there’s a solid gameplay reason why interstellar flight at high fractions of c is any better or worse than interstellar flight at low multiples of c), and the other would let you take far fewer technical liberties (which may be a good thing for the rest of the game) at the expense of including a very obvious sci-fi element.

Quick follow up. For clarity, I'm fine - and in fact pleased - that the developers seem to have a vision with KSP2 which they're sticking to. Based on what we know at the moment it's not one that I'm particularly excited by, but that's my problem. But there's no getting around the fact that much of what we've seen so far is firmly in the realms of science-fiction anyway, so I'm amused by the 'this sci-fi OK, that sci-fi is sci-fi' responses to the OP. Edit - what Brikoleur said. This sort of interstellar travel should be an external factor (as far as the kerbals are concerned) to discover and use, rather than something that appears in the tech tree.

Well gosh. It's a good thing that KSP2 isn't going to include any propulsion systems that may not even be mathematically possible let alone practical. Or engines which work on paper but which come with a bucket of unsolved engineering problems. I think that a non kerbal-made jumpgate would be good idea actually. Have a single sci-fi plot device for enabling interstellar travel and dial back all the crazytech interstellar rocket engines that may as well be sci-fi anyway. But it looks like that boat has sailed. Bring on the metallic hydrogen engines and torchships!

The next chapter is up Twenty-Five This could be the very minute I'm aware I'm alive All these places feel like home With a name I'd never chosen I can make my first steps As a child of 25 Snow Patrol: Chocolate Patbro watched the car pull up at the foot of the hill and a familiar figure climb out of the passenger seat. The figure leaned through the car window for a moment before stepping back and waving as it drove off. Then he turned and walked up the path towards the hut, a thoughtful expression on his face. “How is she?” Jonton smiled. “Very well. She’ll be happier once she’s able to get outside again, I think. I got the distinct impression that that part of being an-Kerm is starting to become tedious.” Patbro chuckled. “No. Tivie was never one for sitting around.” His expression turned serious. “And how’s her Kerm?” “Lively. If she’s anything like this once she’s Awakened, then uncle Elton is going to have a full-time job on his hands, for want of a better expression.” Jonton looked at his friend. “Her Awakening isn’t far away either, if I’m any judge. I’m still happy to be one of her Anchors, if you’d like.” Patbro took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “I would – thanks.” He raised his eyebrows. “Uncle Elton?” Jonton looked at him wryly. “It rolls off the tongue more easily than ‘Kerm that I would like to be my daughter but isn’t my daughter’. I think he feels a certain responsibility for her, having given up part of his territory to make room for her.” “He’s taking the idea of a family very seriously.” “Yes – which is probably a good thing. If he can set an example for Tivie’s Kerm and Ludvis’s too, then there’ll be just enough room to plant a new Kerm between them. Tivie, Ludvis, Elton and Jonelle should make a nice Cluster with room for one more volunteer if we get one.” “Which could be whoever sets up between Tivie and Ludvis?” “I’m not sure. Possibly. I think it depends on the range of Kerm ages that we get for the other three Kolan Clusters.” Jonton scrubbed the back of his hand on his forehead. “Although there aren’t any middle-aged Kerm around Barkton.” “Just old-timers and new saplings,” Patbro agreed. His voice turned wistful. “I wish my old-timer wasn’t planted so far away.” Jonton gripped his friend’s shoulder. “He can be the start of a new Barkton Cluster once the One-Twenty are awake.” Assuming that’s what they choose, he added silently. If Patbro shared his reservation, it didn’t show on his face. “How many are Awake now?” “The Berelgan think that Tivie’s will be the twenty-fifth. Difficult to say for sure since the times from going an-Kerm to Awakening have been all over the place so far and there doesn’t seem to be any obvious pattern between Kerm age, Keeper age and Awakening time.” Jonton smiled. “The next two have only just gone an-Kerm though, so they’re pretty sure that Tivie will be next.” “Twenty-five Awakened Kerm.” Patbro shook his head. “We’d better get on with this second telegraph line then. Do we know where it’s going yet?” “Eventually? Anywhere that Elton wants - it’s just a telephone line after all. For now though, it’ll probably be mostly for calls to the first Doreni Cluster at Almkat. He gets a lot of calls from Enedred’s Cluster in Wakira, so between those and the regular conference calls with Erlin and his team, he thought it would be better to ‘show goodwill and respect’ to the Doreni by having a dedicated line installed for their Clusters.” It was Patbro’s turn to smile. “Very diplomatic.” “And absolutely nothing to do with Jebediah’s report that the Almkat Kerm are as space-crazy as he is,” Jonton agreed. “He’s been spending a lot of time reviewing what memories he has of Jebediah’s namesake and trying to understand how he was able to get everyone to agree to the original Council of Twelve Truths. He hasn’t said as much but I suspect that he sees an alliance with Almkat as a way to garner support for Project Starseed amongst the Doreni Kerm.” “Preserve me. A diplomat and a politician.” Patbro glanced up at Elton’s gently swaying branches. “Although we kerbals could do an awful lot worse.” “Indeed.” Jonton gestured at a large crate and a reel of cable stacked next to his front door. “Shall we make a start on the Doreni hotline?” --------------------- The criss-crossing trails of dead clover stood out clearly against the dense carpet of green which now surrounded Elton’s trunk and Jonton thought he could have found a good site for the second Telegraph interface even without the ring of bright red canes marking the spot. He and Patbro scraped away the first few centimetres of earth with a spade before setting to work with their trowels. One of the red canes tumbled into the deepening trench and Jonton set his trowel aside and cleared away the last of the soil around Elton’s fibre by hand. Patbro handed him the U-shaped emitter jig which fitted easily over a large cluster of nodules on the main fibre, just behind a point where it split into two. Jonton marked the position of the jig holes, set it to one side and drove the two mounting pegs, for the emitter itself, into the soil. “Right then.” Jonton scanned the instruction card taped to the underside of the crate lid, before lifting the emitter assembly out of its packing. “Switch on the installation sensors. Okay, we’ve got two green lights, so the sensors are working and the battery is charged.” “So far so good,” said Patbro. “Yep. Hold the emitter unit by both handles. Depress trigger to release the guide grip, slide unit over the mounting pegs, and carefully lower it towards the Kerm fibre. An audible warning will sound when the emitter is at the correct height. Release the trigger to lock it in place.” Jonton raised his eyebrows. “I’m so glad they told me to do this carefully.” Patbro shrugged. “Better safe than sorry.” “Hmph.” An insistent bleeping noise sounded from the emitter unit. Jonton lifted it fractionally to shut off the alarm before releasing the trigger. “Okay. Now for the support legs – hmm, these are much easier than I remember. Could you do the backfilling while I hold onto this?” “Not a problem.” Patbro began scooping soil back into the trench before tamping it down, taking special care to pack it around the support legs. Gingerly, Jonton let go of the emitter, hands hovering near the handles in case the alarm went off. Reassured by the silence, he stepped back and retrieved a stainless steel cartridge from the crate before squatting down beside the emitter and unlocking an access panel set into its stem. “Open the port. Insert double ended cartridge here, close the port and lock up.” Jonton got to his feet and watched Patbro threading the telephone cable through a series of guides on the other side of the stem before plugging into its socket on the underside of the emitter’s hemispherical cap. “That should be everything.” Jonton dusted off his hands. “Time for the moment of truth. Well sort of. I guess that part comes later when Elton tries to use it but…" “It definitely won’t work unless you switch it on,” Patbro said gently. “I can do the honours if you like.” “No. No, I should do it.” Jonton unlocked a second access panel, revealing a single switch. He paused for a second then pressed it. A row of green lights under the emitter cap lit up in sequence and then winked out. Patbro gave him a thumbs-up. “One Doreni hotline installed and powered up. He grinned at Jonton. “Now let’s go and face that moment of truth.” --------------------- “Are you getting this?” Chad peered into his viewfinder and adjusted the focus. “Looks fine from here. Reading you loud and clear on the audio pickup.” “Well alright then. Let’s get set up for the big intro.” Chad panned his camera round until the viewfinder showed nothing but blackness edged by curved metal corners. “Patching you through to the studio now, Chad. Going live in two.” “Copy, Flight.” The chatter of technicians and television crew filled his ears alongside the more measured responses from the capsule systems team. Then the background noise cut out, replaced by a single familiar voice. “Good afternoon everyone. I am Leland Kerman and this is a KBS News spaceflight special. With us today will be kerbonaut Chad Kerman, pilot scientist aboard Pioneer 6 and one of two remote operations specialists for this, the fifth Tenacity crew and its first full complement crew of eight kerbonauts.” Leland paused. “Foxham Mission Control has just confirmed that they’re ready and waiting so, without further ado, let’s go live to Tenacity. Can you hear us, Tenacity?” “Loud and clear, Leland. It’s good to have you with us.” “Our pleasure, Chad and thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule.” “You’re very welcome. We’ve been working pretty hard up here for the last couple of weeks and we’re looking forward to giving everyone back home a little guided tour.” Chad cleared his throat. “Right now I’m at the far end of Spoke 1, our outermost spoke. It’s the second one to be completed here aboard Tenacity – I was actually in here just this morning closing out the final set of leak tests and air quality checks.” “I remember James Kerman talking about a ‘new spacecraft smell’ when he first opened Endurance’s hatch. Do you still get that onboard a modern spacecraft?” Chad laughed. “Very much so – and we like to try and keep it that way. A big part of the life support systems – well big for us crew anyhow - are the charcoal filters. They’re mainly for removing any unwanted odours from the spacecraft systems but they do a pretty good job of keeping everything pretty close to new spacecraft fresh, even with eight of us floating around the place.” “Are the spacecraft systems really that smelly?” “The biology racks over in Spoke 5 sure can be. We’ve been running some experiments for the long duration life support team, looking at different algal and bacterial cultures, to try and find one we can use for scrubbing carbon dioxide out of the air. Some of those can get pretty ripe.” “I can imagine. Now, before we start, I’m not seeing a great deal from our camera feed. Am I right in thinking that’s because it’s pointed at the outermost window?” “Absolutely, Leland. I don’t know how much you’ll see from a movie camera but I can tell you now, this view is a treat. Stars upon stars upon stars.” “We’re just getting a black disc, I’m afraid.” “Oh. Well I’ll see what I can do to fix that after the show. Try and give the folks back home an idea of what it’s like. Don’t get me wrong – you never get tired of looking at old Kerbin either, but I’m looking forward to just bringing a ration pack up here sometime and spending some time with the universe over dinner, you know.” Chad stretched out an arm. “For now I’m going to do a slow pan around the module. There’s not much to see at the moment – we’ve got storage lockers and ventilation around the forward window there and then moving around, you can see the hatchway through to the rest of the spoke. Now that we’re cleared for habitation in here, we’ll be keeping the hatch open mostly but we can close it to seal off this module from the rest of the station in an emergency.” The image on Leland’s screen continued its stately pirouette, coming to rest at a second, closed, hatchway that, to his eye, looked very similar to the first. “And this here, is the aft hatch. Identical to the one you just saw to save on manufacturing costs. Right now it doesn’t lead anywhere except hard vacuum but if we were onboard one of the actual colony ships, we’d be facing backwards along the length of the craft towards the engines.” A hand appeared in shot as Chad pointed at the hatch. “And this would be the way into the main living area. During the journey to Duna, the ship will be spinning about its long axis which means that anything through there gets pushed out against the spacecraft hull. It’s not real gravity but it’s the next best thing.” “If you want to see how it works back at home, take a bucket of water, tie a rope to the handle and spin it round your head. Even if the bucket goes upside down the water won’t fall out because the spinning is pressing it against the bottom of the bucket.” Chad pushed off from the hatchway. “You should probably try that outside though.” Leland chuckled. “Yes, for the benefit of our audience, KBS News recommends that any scientific experiments involving swinging buckets of water around, be carried out outside. Oh – now this is looking a little more lived in?” The view from Chad’s camera showed the interior of what appeared to be an immense tubular blanket, wide enough for two kerbals to pass one another with ease. On the left-hand side, a row of flattened, slightly convex, lighting panels stretched along the tube wall linked by slender fabric sleeves. Leland tilted his head to one side, trying to match up the image on the screen against what he knew of Tenacity’s construction. Here and there along the opposite side of the tube, somebody had stuck a handful of posters depicting scenes from Kerbin. They were, Leland noted, mostly of woodland or other rural scenes, and he wondered if any of the kerbonauts aboard the station had put up a picture of their Grove. Between the posters, sections of webbing had been strung up and now held a eclectic assortment of high tech equipment, squeeze tubes of water, paperback novels and other personal items. “Yep, that’s the great thing about Tenacity,” Chad said. “There’s enough room for us to get some personal space. When you’re down in the Hub or the Bridge modules, there’s no getting away from the fact that you’re inside a spacecraft but out in the spokes it’s quite cosy. Although, unless you’re in a spoke that’s rigged with equipment racks, there is a limit to what you can attach to the walls. Hang on – I’ll just leave the camera here a minute.” There was a confusing jumble of images and then Chad appeared in-shot, floating next to one of the posters. “Can you see me?” “We can see you fine and I think our viewers will really be getting that zero-G feeling, watching you.” “Excellent. Now, I’m gonna let you all into the big secret of living in space.” Chad peeled back a corner of the poster revealing a patch of bristly looking fabric. “Good old hook-and-loop fasteners. Pretty much everything you see in here is stuck to the wall with it and actually, any time you see anything at all attached to a spacecraft wall, it’s a good bet that it’s either welded on or stuck down with hook-and-loop.” Chad pressed the poster back into place. “And before any of your viewers ask, the reason we don’t use thumbtacks in here is not because we’re worried about popping the tube but because we don’t want anything small and sharp getting loose and floating around at eye-level.” “That is a question that a lot of our viewers have asked so thanks for clearing that up for us.” Leland watched the kerbonaut retrieve his camera, orient himself and then push off along the spoke, the almost perfectly steady movement of the camera making him feel slightly nauseous. “Okay then, we’re passing through the hatch into the knuckle module. This is the halfway point of the spoke and, as you can see, it’s got a window over there and two docking ports on the other sides. Right now, we’ve got a Power, Assembly and Logistics module or PAL docked outside but down on Spoke 4 we’re looking forward to hosting the very first Duna shuttle prototype, courtesy of a whole lot of hard work from our Doreni colleagues over the last year.” “And some help from the Rockomax Corporation?” “I believe so, Leland, although I’m told that the shuttle is an all-Doreni design. I’m no propulsion specialist but I know a lot of folks have been getting very excited about their KR-1L engine from Kerbodyne. Anyway, their first LKO test flight is underway but if all goes well, their second test vehicle should be docked to Spoke 4 in a month or so.” “For more of that new spacecraft smell?” Chad grinned. “Yep! Incidentally, that PAL outside used to be docked on the back of the Hub module – we moved it to this spoke to help out with construction and to free up a docking port for the second Bridge module.” Chad drifted over to the window. “Now, the angles aren’t great from here, so I’m going to pass you across to Mission Control for a moment, so you can get a good look from one of our external cameras.” Leland’s screen flickered and suddenly he was outside the space station, staring at the PAL spacecraft docked to its spoke, photovoltaic arrays gleaming in the sunlight and its robotic arm angled towards the far end module where Chad had begun his tour. The camera tilted before zooming in on the knuckle window from which the kerbonaut was waving back at him. “Oh my.” “It’s something isn’t it? I was out on the end of the arm the week before last, helping to nudge that second inflatable section into place. Riding that thing is a blast – makes the EVA so much easier!” Somewhat to Leland’s regret, his screen flickered again and he was back inside Tenacity. “Welcome back. Let me just get myself turned around here. Little push against the window frame… and there we go.” Chad slipped through the hatchway and along a second fabric tube, which was also adorned with posters and the occasional photograph. Leland caught a glimpse of a group of kerbals sitting around a picnic table, mugs hoisted at the photographer. “Okay, around the hatch here you can see the couplings for the equipment racks.” Chad pointed at a set of clamps and connectors on either side of the hatchway. “Mechanical interface, power supply and data feeds. You can fit in two racks per module but it doesn’t leave you with much of a gangway. Not a problem once we’ve finished up the wheel – we can designate any double-racked spokes as a one-way street so to speak but right now it’s kind of handy to have enough room for two crew to get past each other.” Chad checked his slow drift against the hatch frame before poking his head through. Leland reeled away from his screen at the sudden vertiginous sense of space yawning below him before perspective reasserted itself. “And welcome to the Hub. In here, you can almost believe that you’re flying a spacecraft again. Hi, Milden. Quick wave for the folks back home?” “Hi, Chad. Hello everyone.” “What’s on the tasklist for today then, Milden.” The other kerbonaut dipped her head. “Um, clearing any fan debris and checking the filters. Then Mitzen and I are prepping the rack mounts in Spoke 7.” “I was just telling Leland about the filters. Are you still with us, Leland?” “We’re right here, Chad, and wondering if kerbonaut Milden could spare us a moment to talk about the fan debris. That sounds pretty serious?” “Oh it’s nothing much,” Milden said. “All the hard modules here are equipped with ventilation fans to keep the air moving in zero-gravity and to pull it through the air conditioning units where the carbon dioxide is taken out and fresh oxygen put back in. The fans also act like little suction-cleaners – any loose items floating around tend to find their way to a fan eventually, so keeping them clear is one of our housekeeping tasks.” “If you find my lucky cufflink, that would be great,” Chad put in. “No idea where that’s got to.” Leland got a distinct impression that the other kerbonaut was trying not to roll her eyes. “I will, Chad. I should be getting on though – it was good to speak to you, Leland.” “Thank you for your time, Milden.” Chad watched Milden disappear into one of the spokes before turning his attention back to the camera. “Where were we. Ah yes – the Hub.” He cleared his throat. “On the actual colony ship, the Hubs are designed as emergency radiation shelters for the crew in case of any sunspot activity from Kerbol. They’ll also contain the acceleration couches for the crew to use during any significant manoeuvres. Here on Tenacity, we’re using our Hub as the main eating and sleeping area.” The camera turned to give a view of a set of shelves, sleeping bags and more elasticated webbing for personal effects. “The sleeping arrangements haven’t changed much since our very first space station, Endurance. They’re simple but they work and they’re pretty comfy in zero-G. We keep the dining table packed away during the day – one less thing for everyone to bump into. Chad checked his watch. “We’re almost out of time I’m afraid folks, but I’ve got one last thing to show you before we go. Spoke 4 is pointing at Kerbin right now and the view out of the window there is pretty good – but you’ve all seen the inside of a spoke now. So we’re gonna head through to the first Tenacity module to be launched into space.” He pushed off one of the sleeping shelves and towards a dim hatchway. “This is the forward gangway leading to the main docking port. And here,” Chad reached over his head, caught a handhold and began pulling himself along the ladder, “is the access way to the Bridge. Officially it’s the forward observation deck but on the actual colony ship it’ll be the bridge, so that’s what’s stuck. As he emerged from the access tube, he heard a sudden intake of breath over his headset. “Pillars preserve me.” The veteran broadcaster’s voice shook. “It looks ready to fly.” Chad drifted over to the centre seat, panning the camera round as he went. Everyone in the KBS studio were treated to a view of the seats secured to the convex floor and the instrument panels and monitoring stations arranged around the outside walls, before the image on their screen settled on the view of Kerbin through the bridge windows. Then the camera tilted up slightly and zoomed in to reveal three items secured to the centre window frame. A carved wooden space capsule, its darkly polished surface reflecting streaks of blue light from outside sat flanked by a miniature flag of all Kerbin on one side and a equally miniature pennant emblazoned with a white cross painted on a tree stump and a stylised hand clutching a dripping paintbrush. “Guardian Elton’s gift, the flag of all Kerbin and the White Cross Company logo. How completely appropriate.” “We thought so,” Chad said soberly. “Having all three of them there with Kerbin in the background – well it helps put this whole thing into perspective.” ---------------- Gusemy climbed out of the off-roader and eyed the Veiidan squad with trepidation. Clad from head to foot in Kerm-protective gear complete with helmets and full-face steel mesh masks, they resembled a cross between a motorcycle racer and a warrior from one of the more lurid historical dramas. The overall effect would have been comical were it not for the obviously Kerm-worn state of their armour and the air of grim competence that hung over them. Their sergeant stepped up to Gusemy’s companion and saluted. “Perimeter is set, sir. Bravo squad report no sightings of resistance.” “Acknowledged.” The commander frowned for a moment then shrugged and turned to Gusemy. “Right. Let’s get you suited up, sir.” He opened the back of the off-roader, hauled out two sets of armour and began climbing into one. Following his lead, Gusemy removed his shoes before pulling on a pair of heavy padded trousers, their tough fabric slightly ridged under his fingers. By the time he’d donned his belt, matching padded jacket and steel capped boots, the sergeant had sorted through the pile of plates, straps and buckles at his feet. “Vest on first.” A heavy chest and backplate linked by shoulder straps dropped over his head. The chestplate gave slightly as the sergeant tightened its waist straps and Gusemy felt the metal plates inside shifting in their pockets. Knee, elbow and shoulder pads went on next followed by supple chain gauntlets and an aluminium gorget around his neck. The sergeant studied him for a moment. “That’ll do. He’s all set, sir.” “Thank you, sergeant.” The commander studied Gusemy too. “Right. You’ve been to your share of neo-Kerman villages and I’ve heard you can stay calm with a gun pointed at you. That’s good.” He looked the ambassador in the eye. “Unfortunately, the Children of Kerbin are nothing like your average neo-Ker. One camp might come quietly, the next will fight you tooth, nail and vine. Your armour should keep you out of most trouble but if it all goes south you hit the dirt and let my lot deal with it. Do I make myself clear?” “Quite clear, Commander. Thank you.” The other grunted in reply before turning to his squad. “Form up, move out, and stay sharp for Kerm trees.” The squad formed up around Gusemy and set off towards the forest at a trot. Weighed down by his armour, the ambassador did his best to keep up but by the time they reached the treeline, his gorget was already chafing and his shoulders were starting to ache. As they slipped into the forest, the Veiidans fanned out and, much to his relief, slowed to a fast walk. As they pushed on into the forest, Gusemy swore he could see shadows flitting between the trees. The commander made a low hooting noise before making a sharp hand gesture to his troops. He saw Gusemy’s raised eyebrows and nodded. “It’s them,” he advised quietly. “Good woodcraft – we wouldn’t be seeing them unless they wanted us to.” A cold trickle of sweat ran down Gusemy’s back and, despite himself, he swallowed hard. “Yeah, I don’t like it either. Remember – if it goes south, hit the dirt.” The sergeant jogged over and muttered something into her commander’s ear. A grim look crossed his face and he glanced at Gusemy before turning his attention back to their surroundings. The forest began to thin out around them until they emerged on the edge of a large clearing, dotted with tree stumps. Further back, clapboard hut, linked by cobbled paths, had been built around the larger trees. Gusemy’s nostrils twitched at the mingled scents of woodsmoke and drying fish and he noticed a larger hut, constructed from rough-dressed stone and set well away from the others, a ragged tendril of smoke leaking from its chimney. Here and there, pieces of more modern technology broke the rusticity. Gusemy spotted the occasional hut sporting an antenna or photovoltaic array on its roof and some of the huts were equipped with steel rain barrels. And, in the very centre of the clearing, he was unsurprised to see a larger hut built around a Kerm tree. Around the edges of the clearing hut doors opened and groups of grey-clad figures filed silently into the clearing dressed in long cowled ponchos. In eerie unison they pushed back their cowls, revealing circlets of woven Kerm leaves around their foreheads and lines of livid raised weals across their cheeks. To Gusemy’s horror, the younger figures bore lines of swollen and still-weeping puncture marks. The sudden hiss of indrawn breath from the commander told him that the Veiidan recognised them too but before he could say anything, one of the figures broke away from the group, hands flung out in surrender. Before she could take more than a second step she was cuffed to the ground, the impact cutting off her sudden cry. “Kermbal minsathona!” One of the figures stepped forward and spat on his sprawling companion before lifting his head and staring contemptuously at the Veiidans. “I see the cowards and the unworthy have arrived at last.” << Chapter 109 Chapter 111>>

If your player wants cool stuff and mechs from orbit then I suggest they go play in Sandbox. Also So when I point out ways that making those features optional might impact balancing, you come back with: Emphasis added. It's perfectly OK to just state that you disagree with me and move on without tying yourself in logical knots trying to get the last word in. I'm done here.

Sure - but what else does ignoring thermal effects do? Does that stop engines overheating? Does it make any difference to the parts that need radiators? Okay, removing those effects also makes the game easier but it still means that switching off aero heating has knock-on effects that need to be balanced and that the player might not want. So you phase in the various concepts gradually or have a decent and easy to find in-game reference to explain how they work. Neither of which are novel concepts in game design. Besides, for the examples we're talking about, KSP either does a decent job of smoothing that learning curve or, with respect, there's not much of a learning curve there anyway. Antenna range isn't a particularly hard game mechanic to grasp and it's barely a factor anyway for LKO or Munar flights which is where new players are going to be spending most of their time. Likewise aero-heating. If I recall correctly LKO flights don't need a heatshield at all, whilst Mun/Minmus flights do need them but with a very wide margin for error. I don't even recall aerobraking at Duna being problematic from an aero-heating point of view. I never did much around Eve or Jool so I can well imagine that things get more challenging there but then by the time a player is flying out there, I'd think they'd be experienced enough with the game to take aero-heating in their stride. Aircraft I don't know about but again, building planes isn't a particularly newbie friendly part of the game anyway so again, aero-heating is the least of their worries there.

It's a good question and I'm not helped in answering it by the fact that I haven't played KSP in years so I'm several versions of out of date and probably misremembering the last version that I did play. But here goes. Comm range - yeah I'm struggling there too to be honest. G-limits - I remember seeing contracts where the whole point is to spin a kerbal fast enough to cause them to black out. What I don't know is how that is impacted by joint strength between the different parts and whether parts will separate under enough tensile stress, for example by spinning them fast enough. Any feature that relies on getting joint strength right is probably (maybe? sort of?) going to affect the game whether or not G-limits are switched on. Plasma blackout - again that does seem pretty binary. It either happens or it doesn't, other aspects of the game affect it, but it doesn't affect them so far as I can see. Aero heating - that seems like the most clear cut case to me. Off the top of my head it's going to depend on three things - achievable velocities within atmosphere, the atmosphere model of density against height and some kind of thermal model that tells the game how hot a part gets at a given speed in a given atmosphere density and at what temperatures do parts start exploding. Changing the first two of those is definitely going to impact the game even if aero heating is switched off and the third one might, depending how the thermal model is set up. If I could flip your question around a bit though, what is it about those particular features that makes folks want to get rid of them? And rather than just throwing in the towel and making them optional, could you change them to be fun enough that folks don't want to get rid of them, or at least are less likely to? That may not be possible of course, and I'm also mindful that too complicated or complexity for complexity's sake can be just as bad if not worse than a simpler feature. But still - fixing the feature rather than just making it optional is the way I tend to lean. Agreed. I happen to think that Districts are pretty well designed. At a very basic level you can just plop them down as needed without worrying too much about the additional complexity. At my sort of skill level there are some basic strategies that make them better without involving too much extra thought or planning (Commercial Hubs on rivers, Holy Sites or Campuses by mountains). Then, at the far end of the scale, you can build these incredible finely-tuned conurbations with groups of Districts spread out over several cities. (Germany, I'm looking at you here ) The point is though, that Districts scale well. They don't penalise new players particularly but they do provide a lot of incentive to get better at using them.

Thanks for the encapsulation discussion folks. Not something I was aware of, so I learned something today. In return, I’d like to offer a counterexample to try and explain why I’m supporting @Brikoleur‘s thesis here. Districts. Specifically districts in Civ 6. They changed a longstanding convention in the game, changed a lot of gameplay mechanics around city placement and management, added a fair bit of complexity and (arguably) would appeal more to players who enjoy a certain style of play. In short, very much a feature that I would expect to fall into the ‘make it optional’ field of thought. Particularly as Civs 1-4 (and I think 5) managed just fine without them. The thing is, making them optional would be extremely hard, encapsulation notwithstanding. Take them out and, whilst you can rejig some gameplay mechanics to work without them fairly easily, other mechanics will break entirely and require some kind of replacement system. (For those that play Civ 6, I’m thinking about adjacency bonuses and the way the different resource points are calculated). Then you get the knock-on effects such as certain bonuses for quite a few playable Civs disappearing and all the rebalancing that would be required to compensate for that. As far as I can see, you would virtually have to write two separate games, one with districts enabled, one with them switched off. It would certainly be possible - as I mentioned, previous versions of Civ have done very well without districts - but I can imagine it being a lot of work. Exponentially so if you have other optional features to contend with. So at some point I think it’s necessary to decide how a game is going to work given that budgets and developer time are finite. If a given feature is going to be optional, how complex is that feature in terms of the way it interacts with other game systems and how much would those other game systems need to be modified or replaced to accommodate the optional feature being switched off? At some point it becomes impractical to make a feature that is both complex (in the good way to quote @Brikoleur again) and optional. So where do you compromise? At one end of the scale you simplify and keep it optional at the other end of the scale you keep the complexity but make it mandatory. In practice this is unlikely to be a straightforward binary choice and you go for something in between. Personally, I prefer the ‘mandatory but complex’ end of the scale. Other folks may prefer the other end. But accommodating both preferences at once is difficult.

Yep. Last time I checked the game was called Kerbal Space Program not Kerbal Settings Program. No arguments from me on any of that but especially this Give me an out-of-the-box game like that and I’ll be happy. By all means make it moddable but mods should (in my opinion anyway) be there to extend the stock game not create it. Put another way I completely disagree with the notion that the developers should provide a framework and leave it up to modders to turn that framework into a game. I would also agree that with a solid base to build on, modders can do incredible work. You only have to think of the various total conversion mods out there for various games. Or, to pick an example from the top of my head, the Caveman to Cosmos mod for Civ 4, which took a very solid stock game and gave it more of everything. A little too much so in my opinion but you can’t fault the ambition. But CtC was in no way required to make up for a lacklustre stock Civ 4 experience.

It also makes it easier (everything else being equal) to design a deeper and more interesting game if you can rely on a set of features always being there. That way you can use them as a foundation to build other features or bits of gameplay on. It's kind of hard to include AwesomeFeatureX if it depends on optional features A B and C to work. Put another way, I'd much prefer to have a deeper, more interesting game where different gameplay features work with each other than have those features all siloed off into individually toggleable minigames. I think it's fair to say that @Brikoleur and I have our differences of opinion about what makes an interesting game but I'm right behind him(?) on this point.

Sounds like a plan. Hey - you could hang a big net out the back of your spacecraft to capture the exhaust and recycle it as snacks.

And - once again - that article says nothing about metastable metallic hydrogen. I don't think anyone here is disputing that metallic hydrogen is a thing - or very likely to be a thing. But unless you can store it at a reasonable pressure then it loses its value as a rocket propellant.

Have you considered inertial confinement popping? I believe that ejecting the kernels behind the spacecraft and then popping them with a radiant heat source, or possibly a maser, could lead to a significant mass-flow increase without the need for butter. In fact I imagine you could get up to a significant fraction of c with such an engine.

I don’t suppose you could gimmick up a hay powered engine could you? A popcorn drive sounds just the thing for feeding the space elves currently powering my ship but I was rather hoping to upgrade the engine to a Magic Unicorn Drive. Hence the need for hay.

For rocket science values of easy, yes. I'm mindful of Starpopper and other learning experiences they've had with Starship so far. Historically, SpaceX has been good at the 'learning' part of their learning experiences but that's still a mighty big rocket stage to put together.

So Prometheus they say. Brought god's fire down to man. And we've used it, tamed it, feared it, since our history began. Now we're going back to heaven. Just to look Him in the eye. There's a thunder 'cross the land and a fire in the sky.

And that's just the second stage. Whole thing is eventually going to be sitting on top of a Superheavy. Mind. Blown.