meve12

Only if you don't take off fast enough. I think you've got the TWR. Worst comes to worst, quicksave before you do it.

As a suggestion: Lower the landing legs to prop the ship up, turn of the SLS, throttle MAX, turn ON the SLS, hang on for dear life.

I take it the TransHab is part of an endurance upgrade?

...Oh dear.

Why is the engine exhaust magenta?

Discovery Too? And NOWUCME for a lander.(You are taking one along, yes?)

Can we have PWings with that? And a 2.5m fuselage?

Wow, that's pretty neat. Now I wish someone would mod that in, it'd go well with bi-conic reentry capsules.

I always thought that was goats. Unless we're not talking about Gruff?

Are we going to be running tests on sea shells? More seroiusly: science that takes a while. Mapping the surface from orbit for better maps and SCIENCE!, mapping magnetospheres, observing weather phenomena, whatever. Preferably you can leave it running for a bit while you get on with other things.

Shaped charges are actually 85% efficient, actually, compared to 10% for an unshaped charge. Project Rho here can explain it better: http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/spacegunconvent.php#id--Nukes_In_Space--Nuclear_Shaped_Charges But from what I read, gamma rays emitted from a nuclear initiation are contained and directed by a jacket of depleted uranium into a load of berylium oxide, which converts them into heat which is dumped into a plate of tungsten propellent, which becomes a focused jet of plasma in the desired direction. There's no humongous backblast like you seem to be assuming.

With an ISP of 43,000 m/s? Hardly. Or did you miss the bit about nuclear shaped charges? I might add that a 'conventional' NERVA has only an ISP of 8093 m/s at best.

On that note: Could there be environmental hazards that certain instruments could forewarn about before it happens? Thermometers warning of heat problems close to the sun, for example. This would count as a science report for low orbit of the sun, but would also have text warning about heat problems. This could give a reason to view instruments to scout out hidden dangers, not just for science points.

If that's added, I'd also make the NERVA engine use nuclear fuel(blutionium?) and liquid fuel(propellant?). Although I don't see why use it on space stations over solar panels or RTGs unless you're doing something very energy intensive. Otherwise seems like a waste.

The "Nuclear SRB", as I read it, seems to assume a perfectly reflective tube lining. So no, not as Larry Niven envisioned.

THAT armor? Conventional cannon won't do it, not high enough muzzle velocity. Railgun/MAC, maybe. Missiles would either be KKVs or nukes. Or Casablanca-Howitzers.

Other than Argon consumption, I agree with NorthStar. Maybe make it a 1.25m part and include 1.25m xenon tanks? Like a energy-intensive upgrade over the 909.

Looks like a LV-T30.

I'd like to keep movable samples, but other than that this is good.

The problem with that being that the mirror gets pushed by the beam as well. So it'll need a long endurance guidance package and attitude control at the very least, and you waste one per mission since there's no way to recover it. Personally, I'd prefer a Maser Sail departure stage and a rambrake/fission fragment rocket arrival stage.

I'll just point out that this won't really work like a brachistochrone trajectory; turnover would have to be well before halfway as the target system's starlight is not as 'concentrated' as your launching laser. Which means no lighthugger shenanigans until a receiver laser is constructed. I'd probably wait until nanoassemblers and disassemblers are invented so that the first ship could do just that.

Convergent Evolution?

I figured a single, lossless, generator would play like that anyway above a particular level; it'd be cheaper for larger ships to have a generator than to carry non-regenerative life-support. Biodomes and ice machines, on the other hand, are encouraged to stay put, thus encouraging surface bases instead of orbiting fuel depots for landers. Furthermore, said bases can act as local gas stations so that your Joolian missions, for example, can explore the system without reliance on resupply from Kerbin.

I hate to toot my own horn, but everyone seems to have missed my suggestion here: http://http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/80130-Is-Squad-ever-going-to-add-stock-life-support/page6 Does anyone know how to mark a particular post?

I would think that even a bio-dome would lose resources over time(leaks and all.) I suggest that if we go with just oxygen/carbon diooxide: *Non-regenerative Life support and EVA life support would be automatic and noty dependent on electricity. *Biodomes would recycle CO2, but also at a slight loss, as well as being heavy and power hungry. *Mechanical life support(Sabetier reactors) would be much lighter and power efficient, but at higher loss rates.(I'm aware this consumes hydrogen rather than oxygen, but it could be abstracted for the sake of gameplay.) *Water/ice can be found (by samples, and later by scansats) and mined on most of the planets/moons, albeit with heavy and power hungry machinery. They would be infinite supplied, but limited to a few randomly chosen, fixed, and widespread positions to encourage permanent, widespread bases. *Water/Ice can be converted to oxygen and liquid fuel, and oxygen can be converted into oxidizer. This would, again, be power intensive, although not necessarily with heavy machinery. *This should be balanced to favor, for bases, mining and converting water to support a biodome rather than mechanical life-support. *Mechanical life-support should be balanced towards use on ships and other mobile, long endurance craft(Large rovers and long range aircraft/landers and such, rather than small gocarts and gliders) Possible for use on space stations as well, although I'd think a biodome would be better. *Non-regenerative life support is available from the get-go, mechanical would be available around tech 5 (Space Exploration?), Biodomes and Ice mining would be tech 7-8 (Advanced Science Tech and Large Electrics, respectively?) Edit:Last bullet-point is only a rough idea of which techs go where, may need some refinement. Also, oxygen/CO2 could be measured in kerbal-days(enough for one kerbal for one (Kerbin) day.) I suggest that Capsules/Crewed parts and EVA suits would have enough for an hour at max crew capacity(around 1/7th of a kerbal day for the Mk.1 Command Pod, or 3/7ths for the Mk.1-2) and that dedicated storage be made available around tech 3 (Survivability?)