Burke112

I think the problem people have is assuming the public has to come together to support a project for it to actually be completed. As the Apollo program showed, programs can be very successful, even if they are opposed by a large segment of the population, and even if they are very controversial in Congress as Apollo was -- which is why Congress cut NASA's budget very severely every single year starting in 1964 and continuing until the Apollo 11 moon landing. The Apollo program had to manage to survive Congressional budget cuts for the majority of its existence, and the American public certainly did not "come together" to support it. On the contrary, the entire program was viewed by many Americans as a giant waste of money that wouldn't do anything to solve problems on Earth; hence the program's low standing in 1960s public opinion polls. As far as calls to action... President Obama did call on NASA to send humans to Mars in a highly televised speech, so there is that. I would have liked it if he designed his speech with a bit more of a charismatic flair, though. As far as giving the public visible spectacles to prove progress was being made, that may or may not be the purpose of the asteroid mission. Whether or not that was the purpose, a manned rendezvous with an asteroid (which is an unprecedented event) would do a lot to convince people progress was being made. Also, the early American space program didn't exactly give many Americans confidence that progress was being made -- just look up the Vanguard TV3 launch incident and the political fallout it caused. The media had a field day -- it was nicknamed the "Stayputnik" the "Oopsnik" and the "Flopnik" in national newspapers. The Soviet delegate to the United Nations even joked that the United States might be interested in receiving aid earmarked for undeveloped countries. And it wasn't the only failure -- there were quite a few. One of the jokes that was made in the early 1960s was that American rockets "always blew up." We should obviously remember events such as Apollo 8, Apollo 11, and the countless other successful launches. However, we shouldn't forget the (many) failures and convince ourselves that the American space program involved a continuous string of successful launches that provided sterling examples of progress being made.

AFAIK, the preparations for the Mars mission are currently already budgeted -- those of you who remember the 2012 election will remember the chain e-mail about how "stupid" NASA was for funding studies on Mars food preparation, and Rand Paul's statement about how NASA was using taxpayer money to "pay teenagers to sit on couches eating pizza." Frustrating as those comments were, they do show that the program is receiving funding. Also, wherever NASA goes on the project, SpaceX appears to be surging forward in their goals by leaps and bounds -- has anyone seen the video of the latest grasshopper test? If/When that is implemented on the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy, it could make virtually the whole rocket reusable, and reduce the time/cost required to reuse the parts (i.e. they don't fall to Earth in the middle of nowhere, where they have to be picked up for a relatively high amount of money, or in sea water, which causes corrosion that must be repaired before reuse). Hopefully, they manage to realize Musk's goal of having the rocket reusable within "single digit hours" of the second stage returning to the pad. Potentially, that would mean being able to reuse an entire rocket in just under two days, although that would, of course, rely on there being enough demand to justify that kind of turnaround time. I guess it's a question of getting the price of launch down to the point where the extra demand the lower price generates allows you to accelerate the turnaround time, to in turn reduce the price of launch. Depending on whether you're one of the glass-half-full or glass-half-empty types, you could see that as either a vicious cycle of lowering launch costs (with a lower limit, obviously), or as a dog chasing its tail kind of event that will never come to fruition. If they get their 140 metric ton Falcon XX operational, that would be very good as well. The combination of the ability to carry large payloads and the ability to launch relatively frequently could allow SpaceX to take advantage of economies of scale, which would definitely reduce launch costs. Also, the Falcon XX would have a payload-to-LEO capability on par with the final version of the SLS, so it would have potential to achieve Musk's goal of getting people to Mars, although whether or not he will be able to get the price down to the $500,000 per seat he has as his goal is a whole 'nother question. Regardless, the lower launch cost would be very useful for NASA -- because they have contracts with SpaceX to deliver cargo and, by 2017, crew to LEO, lowering the cost of the launch would lower the amount of money NASA must spend per year on putting satellites into orbit and shuttling crew and cargo to the ISS and back, which would in turn allow NASA to devote a larger percentage of its budget to other activities.

Where you get the idea that I'm using ad-hominem attacks is beyond me. I'm making a statement; if you're sensitive to the point that you can't handle people with differing opinions, and you thus feel that anyone with such opinions is personally attacking you, I'd suggest either growing a thicker skin, or just not expressing your opinions, as there will always be people whose opinions differ from your own, and if you are sensitive to the point of not being able to handle differing opinions, the world of debate simply isn't for you. Yes, the late Roman Empire experienced apathy, political infighting, and political scandles. However, you make the mistake of assuming those features were novel to the late empire, and thus were integral to Rome's decline, instead of features that had been with Rome since the very beginning. To provide context for your opinions, I'd suggest reading Livy's history of the Roman empire. He expressed his fear that modern (at the time) Roman society was filled with apathy, political strife driven by politicians more concerned with personal gain than common good, and extremely immoral behavior. Just observe the rampant political corruption that occurred during the time period, or ancient Romans' seeming obsession with violent spectacles, or the many scandles that occurred at the time, such as Emperor Augustus' daughter sleeping with half of the Roman Senate, and you'll see that all the apathy, infighting, and scandles you mention were exceedingly common during this time period. In fact, Livy himself stated that he had become "disgusted by the modern world" where such events had become seemingly commonplace, and that he was compiling his history of Rome specifically to give people examples of the good ol' days when Romans exhibited nobler traits. And what did he find? How "good" were the good ol' days? Well, Livy was apparently quite disappointed, as his studies of Roman history found that the Roman past was filled with just as much apathy, violence, political strife, and scandal as the Roman present. Like you, he believed that these ignoble traits were novel features that were quickly bringing about Rome's demise (keep in mind, he wrote his chronicles one hundred years before Rome reached its peak). However, he found that these traits had been with Romans since day one -- they were nothing new. I think the concept that the modern world is filled with strife, and that there was a mythic "good ol' days" when everything was great, is based off of a nostalgia from the past, most likely caused by the fact that those making such statements were often children during the "good ol' days", and children view the world through rose-colored glasses. We view the 1950s as the good ol' days here in America, even though the average American of the 1950s lived ten years less than those today, was almost twice as likely to be poor than Americans today, was much less educated than Americans today (half of all Americans didn't even graduate high school in 1950), had an inflation-adjusted median income much lower than today, were less productive than today's workers (average worker productivity has been rising ever since statistical measurement began), paid much higher income taxes than today (Remember when the top marginal rate was 70%?), and had much worse medical care than today (this was a world where heart medication and modern transplant technology didn't exist). This was a world where America was separated by race, where African Americans in the South essentially could not vote, where people whose only crime was to protest peacefully were attacked by dogs and shot with water cannons. Between Sputnik, the Korean War, espionage between the Soviet Union and United States, the massive buildup in nuclear arms, Cold War hostility, and the general fear that nuclear war was imminent, and millions of people would be vaporized in an instant, I can assure you that the 1950s were NOT the "good ol' days." That's not to say that we don't have problems today. Between climate change, terrorism, and rogue states such as North Korea and Iran, the world today is no more rosy than the 1950s. However, the idea that people have of an idyllic past where everything was peaceful and happy is completely false.

I'll try to keep this brief, since this is a video game/space exploration forum, not a history forum, and I do dislike off-topic discussions... Whether you observe Constantine's stupendous building projects, Flavius Aetius' campaigns against the Gauls, Visigoths, and Huns, Majorian's construction of a massive naval fleet to attack Geiseric and remove the Vandals from North Africa, or Aegidius' largely successful campaign to secure Gaul from Gothic invasion and defeat the invading Ostrogoths, it is pretty obvious that Rome never lost its appetite for doing great things and "be the best." The concept that Rome fell due to apathy was first postulated in Edward Gibbon's book "The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" (which did gain great popularity in Britain during the 1810s and 1820s due to the concern many Britains had that their own empire was collapsing, due to its rampant debt -- but that's neither here nor there). The reason for this explanation was that, during the late Roman imperial period, many changes were observed that were, at the time, inexplicable. Rome had been defending its borders very well against the gothic tribes ever since they began attacking with extreme frequency during Marcus Aurelius' reign in 165 -- so why did the barbarians suddenly break through starting in the 370s? The Roman military was one of the largest in the world -- so why, by the beginning of the fifth century, was it virtually nonexistant? The Roman military machine was famous for its discipline and order -- so why, by the Fifth century, were the Romans utilizing undisciplined barbarian foederati to do their fighting for them? The Roman treasury was filled withassive inflows of tax revenue during the height of the empire -- so why, near the end of the imperial period, were tax revenues virtually zero? The only explanationat the time was that Rome had simply given up being great and had gained a feeling of profound apathy. Today, however, we have access to much greater evidence than Gibbon did. Modern ice core studies indicate that Europe experienced profound cooling starting around 300 C.E.; this cooling became known as the Late Antiquity Cold Period. At the same time, Romans became exposed, through trade, to novel diseases -- illnesses such as Smallpox, the measles, etc first became common in Europe during Late Antiquity, starting with the Antonine Plague in 165 C.E. Because of the dramatically cooler weather, crop yields fell sharply, and these previously unknown diseases took a massive toll on the Roman population. The issue of disease became even more severe when, in a desperate attempt to increase crop yields, Roman farmers began widespread irrigation... and the pools of stagnant water served as great breeding grounds for disease-carrying mosquitoes. Through famine and disease, the Roman population continually dwindled, and deurbanization occurred as many Romans left cities that had become infested with disease (this had a very negative effect, as city-dwellers tend to have a higher average productivity than country-dwellers; hence why urbanization tends to have positive economic effects). So, what is the effect of a shrunken population? First of all, tax revenue falls through the floor, as there are far fewer taxpayers, and the average economic productivity is lower due to deurbanization. Secondly, due to a much smaller population and lower tax revenues, Rome physically could not support a large army. It isn't like today, where Americans debate the merits and drawbacks of increasing or decreasing the size of their military -- Rome simply could not support a large army with their diminished population. It wasn't a matter of apathy or a lack of desire to field a large army; Rome just didn't have a large enough labor pool. But Rome was not the only civilization feeling the effects of the colder weather. Northern Europe simply became too cold to support the large tribes that inhabited those regions during the warm period that characterized much of Rome's history. So, the barbarians moved south. However, as they pushed for greener pastures, they inevitably bumped up against other tribes that already inhabited the region, and through warfare, pushed them out. This set off a "domino effect" of sorts, with thousands of barbarians being forced further and further south, until they reached the Rhine river, and along with it, the border of Rome. And this is where the problem begins. At the same time that Rome physically could not support a large military, barbarian attacks became much larger and more common. In order to defend themselves, Rome was forced to rely more and more upon the aid of foederati, or hired barbarian mercenaries. These mercenaries were not Roman, and so did not display the discipline and organization Roman soldiers are so typical for -- hence the breakdown in Roman military tactics. Also, in order to pay for these soldiers, Rome had to give them land, which led to a vicious cycle of sorts. In order to defend itself, Rome had to hire more foederati. By hiring more foederati, Rome lost tax revenue, and hence could only support a smaller Roman military... and thus had to hire more foederati. This cycle continued until the Roman army was basically nothing more than a relatively small group of unorganized Gothic tribesmen, and all that was left of the western empire was Italy and a single province in Gaul. When Flavius Orestes refused to give the foederati land in Italy as payment, they banded together under Odoacer, and deposed the last Roman emperor (Romulus Augustulus) on September 4, 476 C.E. Odoacer became King of Italy, and the Roman Empire was officially dead. So there you have it! A (very condensed) explanation of the fall of the Roman empire. Rome fell not because of apathy of a lack of ambition -- it fell because a much cooler climate and novel diseases shrank its population, tax revenue, and military size, at the same time as a cooler climate drove waves of barbarian hordes against their border. When they tried to hire foederati to defend themselves, they gradually lost territory (and the money that came with it) until they had only Italy, which was taken by a starving mob of unpaid goths led by a minor Heruli chieftain.

Someone needs to learn him some late Roman history...

“We can always count on the Americans to do the right thing, after they have exhausted all the other possibilities.†-- Sir Winston Churchill The history of the United States tends to be one of extremely profound apathy, followed by some jolting event, followed by frantic, frenzied effort to correct perceived deficiencies. The meaning of the "leading nation in space" thing is probably due to the fact that the United States operates more satellites than any other country, and has sent more probes to other celestial bodies than any other country. The good news is that, while the Space Shuttle has been retired, the DragonRider is being refitted to replace the shuttle in the mission of sending astronauts into space, as part of the CCDev. Currently, there are no lift platforms in any country's inventory capable of carrying humans beyond Earth orbit, and there is only one rocket in development that will be able to take astronauts that far -- the Space Launch System. The only other rocket that will be so capable is the Chinese Long March 9, which is currently in the "paper study" stage, and it is unknown if it will be produced. So, depending on whether or not the LM9 gets beyond the concept phase, either the United States will be the only country capable of sending astronauts beyond Earth orbit, or the United States and China will be the only two countries with such a capability. As far as major planned missions go, the Chinese space agency plans on setting up a small research space station, and there is a proposal to send a taikonaut to the moon in the 2025-2030 timeframe, although like the LM9, that is still in the concept stage, and it is unknown whether or not it will get past the proposal stage and into the planning stage. NASA has proposed using the SLS's upper stage as a new space station, named "Skylab II", but like the LM9 and Chinese manned lunar mission, that is still in the concept stage. NASA's current planned missions include an asteroid rendezvous/landing, sending an astronaut into lunar orbit, and a manned mission to Mars in the mid-2030s (which is in the early planning stages -- with "early" being the operative word). However, the program does appear to be making headway -- President Obama originally wanted to begin production of the SLS in 2015, but Congress accelerated the program and began the design process immediately with the creation of the SLS program in 2011. Personally, my chief worry regarding space exploration is that both China and the United States are developing ASAT systems. If a shooting war ever started, we could say goodbye to low Earth orbit for the next several decades...

The purpose of that list is kind of a "minimum wish list" of sorts -- it was apparently created to represent the absolute minimum the SLS would be used to do; it represents what NASA had the budget to do in a worst-case situation, if their budget was severely cut. Hopefully, as we approach the first launch date, more information will become known. If anyone knows how long prior to STS-1 NASA released a comprehensive schedule of Space Shuttle missions, that would help to provide some kind of context of how much lead time NASA gives when they state mission plans. As far as funding goes, apparently NASA has received money in the 2012 and 2013 budgets to continue preparations for the "Mars 2033" mission. Obviously, they haven't been given money for the actual launch itself -- it's too far away -- but the fact that they are receiving funding to prepare for such a mission is somewhat promising.

Under the current plan, the SLS will conduct an unmanned moon flyby in 2017, a manned lunar flyby in 2021, several crew and cargo transfers to LEO and beyond, a Mars soil sample return in 2024, and an asteroid rendezvous in 2025. Of course, that was a tentative schedule that was based upon a worst-case scenario; the actual schedule will most likely be different. The main reason, as I see it, that we haven't been given a comprehensive schedule for SLS operations is due to the length of time before it will be fully operational. I'm not sure exactly, but does anyone else know how many years prior to 1981 NASA released a comprehensive schedule for which missions the Space Shuttle would undertake?

Apparently, NTRs are being tested once again -- http://www.nasa.gov/topics/technology/features/ntrees.html#.UdjGtvm1Fu4 Apparently, the Nuclear Cryogenic Propulsion Stage is supposed to be used for the whole "manned mission to Mars by the 2030s" thing.

My point was that the whole rose-colored image people have of the Apollo program is incorrect. The truth is that it was a controversial idea that a majority -- and in some cases a considerable majority. -- of Americans believed was a useless waste of money, even during and directly after the landings. There was considerable debate over whether or not they should -- or even could -- be done. My father was thirteen in 1969, and he remembers his parents constantly talking about how wasteful the landings were, and how stupid Nixon was for not discontinuing the program -- and that same viewpoint was shared by many Americans at that point. I support space travel as much as anyone else here. I believe we should travel to the moon, and to Mars, and set up space stations, and refueling depots, and other interplanetary infrastructure. I believe we should continue developing new techniques and technologies to make low(er)-cost space travel a reality, the way SpaceX is today. However, I believe we should not delude ourselves into thinking that such programs will ever receive widespread public support, or that there was some fantastic, idyllic time in the good old days when such programs would. The fact is, space travel will always face entrenched opposition, due to the high cost associated with space operations. Our goal should be to reduce the costs of space travel as much as possible, and to continue pressing forward despite such opposition.

I think too many people have an overly romantic idea about the Apollo program. The whole idea that the United States just "came together as one country to support a mission to the moon" is more or less complete bunk. There was only one single period during the entire Apollo program (both before and during the Apollo landings) where a majority of Americans supported the Apollo program -- and that was right after the Apollo 11 landing, and even then, the approval rate was only 53%. So, even during the period where support for the Apollo program was highest, and exuberance about the space program was at its peak, the Apollo program only managed to eke out an approval rating barely over 50%. And what about the rest of the time during which the program was active? Public approval virtually never even made it to the 45% mark, and for a relatively long period, it was at 35%. That's right -- for quite a long time during the Apollo program years, almost two-thirds of all Americans thought the entire concept of sending people to the moon was a waste of money! In polls conducted directly after the Apollo 11 landings, many Americans believed that the money spent landing on the moon was ill-spent, and could be better spent combating poverty (mostly due to the rampant poverty present in America during the 1950s and early 1960s -- for most of the fifties, almost a quarter of all Americans lived in poverty). In comparison, current support for a manned Mars mission is relatively high -- in polls conducted earlier this year, over half of all Americans believed NASA should either send a manned lander to Mars itself, or play a strong role in aiding a commercial company to do the same thing, and a full 75% of Americans were willing to double NASA's budget for the specific purpose of putting a man on the red planet. In comparison to the tepid support for the Apollo landings, current support for a mission to Mars is relatively high. As far as budget support goes, the current support for increasing NASA's budget is about the same as it was during the late 1960s -- about 14% of Americans in both cases wanted to increase the space budget. Civilian support for cutting the budget, however, is lower -- today, 40% of Americans favor cutting the space budget. During the Apollo years, the percentage of people who believed NASA was spending too much on spaceflight fluctuated between 45 and 60%. As a 1967 New York Times poll indicates, many Americans put cleaning air and water pollution, providing job training for unskilled workers, and spending more on poverty above spending more on space travel, and during the 1960s, several polls indicated NASA's budget as the one that many Americans wanted to cut in order to reduce federal spending. In short, the rosy image we have of the Apollo program is pretty false. For virtually the entirety of the program, a considerable majority of Americans believed it was a bad idea, and that the money should be spent elsewhere, and only once did public support barely break the 50% mark. Americans during the 1960s were more apt to cut NASA's budget than they are today, and current support for a Mars landing is overwhelming compared to the support the moon landings had in the 1960s. And, as far as a "can-do" attitude goes... "The US space program is in decline. The Vietnam War and the desperate conditions of the nation's poor and its cities -- which make spaceflight seem, in comparison, like an embarrassing national self-indulgence -- have combined to drag down a program where the sky was no longer the limit." - Newsweek article, 1968

So, what do you guys think about people who say that the Apollo moon landings were faked? Personally, I find their "proof" to be rather strange (and entirely incorrect), but what do you guys think? I, for one, definitely liked Buzz's reaction to being harassed by Bart Sibrel...

From what I heard, the idea is to use the SLS's upper hydrogen tank (retrofitted, of course) as a space station, similarly to how the Skylab was constructed out of a retrofitted Saturn V tank. I've never heard of the Exploration Gateway Platform -- I'll have to go Google it; it sounds interesting! Apparently, the Mars expedition will use NTRs and orbital construction, and the near-Earth asteroid landing will research the collection of minerals from asteroids. That's definitely an interesting feature; hopefully, the techniques developed and/or researched during this program (NTR use, orbital construction, landing on and mining asteroids) will form the basis of future interplanetary missions and habitation. It seems far fetched, but hey, one can dream, right? There's one other thing that I've been wondering -- since the Orion Service Module will be constructed in Europe, by the ESA, and based off of an earlier European design, would it be possible to include ESA astronauts (Euronauts?) on the missions it is sent on? Sending astronauts to Mars would be great in and of itself, but if a system was set up where not just American astronauts, but also other countries' astronauts, were involved, that would be a great precedent for developing greater cooperation between different countries' space agencies, which would definitely help in procuring funding for more ambitious space projects, as well as promoting greater cooperation between countries in other fields.

As far as I know, the main plan for the SLS/Orion program is landing astronauts on Mars and setting up a temporary habitat for them to live and conduct experiments (I believe five hundred days was the projected length of the stay), then returning them to Earth. The program also includes landings on near-Earth asteroids and missions to send astronauts into lunar orbit (which might be what you are referring to). There are proposals to use the SLS/Orion to land on the moon, as well as to use it to put a new space station (Skylab II) in orbit at EML-2, and the spacecraft will certainly have the ability to conduct both of those missions, but as far as I know, they aren't yet planned. Let's keep our fingers crossed, though.

In the current version of KSP, Laythe appears relatively Earth-like -- it has many characteristics that would allow life to flourish. Laythe's atmosphere at sea level is 80% that of Earth or Kerbin (0.8 atm). This places the air pressure equivalent to that which is found at about a 7,000 foot altitude on Earth. This is well below the 8,000 foot altitude where the first, relatively small, symptoms of altitude sickness begin, and is well below the altitude where HAPE becomes a concern. In fact, most airliners are pressurized to 7,000 feet, so any base on Laythe that was around sea level would expose its occupants to an air pressure similar to that experienced on a jetliner. In short, Laythe's atmosphere is dense enough that Kerbonauts at a sea-level base would be perfectly able to breathe -- the only negative effects would be a slightly lower endurance due to the thinner air, which would itself be offset by Laythe's lower gravity (55% of Kerbin's) making exertion less difficult. Laythe also has liquid seas. These seas apparently have some ionic compound in them, but it would appear that any base with desalination equipment would have access to a huge supply of fresh water. Furthermore, the water is in a liquid state, making it much easier to access than if it was frozen. Because of Jool and the other moons around Laythe, as well as Laythe's relatively thick atmosphere, asteroid impacts would be a relatively small concern, as any incoming asteroids or comets would most likely impact one of the other Joolian bodies, much as the moon currently protects Earth from asteroid impacts. Also, it appears that Laythe is far enough from Jool so that it would not be ripped apart by the planet's gravity, nor would it experience massive vulcanism. The only difficulties that would be found with supporting life on Laythe, it appears, would be the temperature and solar radiance, both of which would be lower due to Laythe's distance from Kerbol. Purely for roleplaying purposes, does anyone know exactly how hospitable Laythe would be for supporting life, and how much the lower temperature and solar radiance would affect photosynthesis?

Well, if Kerbolar (like the term!) research was its purpose, it wouldn't have to be in an eccentric orbit... I guess it could serve as a refueling depot for interstellar travel, if that is ever implemented. I think interstellar travel in KSP is supposed to use a FTL drive, though, so I'm not sure if that would be useful... I have the life support mod installed as well, so I have to keep my Kerballed stations stocked with regular shipments of food (water, oxygen, and CO2 removal are all taken care of by self-sufficient onboard systems)... so what kinds of launch windows could one expect for intercepting a space station in an eccentric Kerbol orbit, in terms of how wide/narrow they are?

Yeah, I guess I had a bit of a stupid moment there and forgot about the simulation being on rails. I'm not sure exactly what purpose such a base would have, except for being very unusual...

While thinking about interesting locations to place space stations, and the idea of putting a station in a highly eccentric orbit around Kerbol, with an apoapsis just outside of Eeloo's orbit and a periapsis closer to Kerbol than Moho, seemed intriguing. What I'm wondering is, would such a station be viable, or would unplanned encounters with other planets, and the gravity assists/brakes that the encounters caused, occur often enough to skew the station's orbit?

Ah. So I got it switched around -- thanks for clarifying!

If I recall correctly, don't gravity assists become less effective the faster you are traveling when you swing by? Since an interstellar trip would have to start with hundreds or thousands of km/s of velocity, as you said, wouldn't that make the effect almost unnoticeable, even before it is compared to the massive amount of dV required for interstellar travel?

Ah. So it wouldn't be possible to get both the Oberth effect and a Jool slingshot? I remember watching one of Scott Manley's videos where he mentioned that you can't utilize both the Oberth effect from Kerbin and a Mun slingshot, but I didn't know if that same principle applied to a Kerbol Oberth effect and a Jool slingshot.

Do you think you'd be able to set up such a trajectory so you could get a gravity assist from Jool during your eccentric orbit around Kerbol, assuming you started from Eeloo? That would probably help somewhat... Now, if interplanetary travel was implemented in a 100% realistic manner, where the stars themselves are in orbits, it would be possible to get a massive gravity assist from Kerbol, but due to issues with data usage and lag, I believe they will simply have the stars be at fixed locations (if I remember correctly). Not completely realistic, but then again, compromises have to be made due to the limitations of the users' personal computers.

Well, whether or not the actual advantage imparted is minimal in comparison to what is required to get to the nearest star system, which planet would require the lowest dV? I guess it could vary -- if the star systems are ridiculously close together, starting from a high orbit would probably be the best, whereas if the stars were reasonably far apart, a low orbit would be better, as the Oberth effect provides a "lasting" benefit to reducing dV use, whereas starting from a high orbit only provides an initial benefit, but nothing beyond that. If the stars were very close (highly unlikely), the initial benefit from starting from a closer location would outweigh the benefit from the Oberth effect, since the trip itself would be too short to fully realize the Oberth effect, but if the stars are placed far apart (much more likely), the benefit from the Oberth effect would outweigh the benefit from starting at an orbit a bit closer to the star. I guess it could be compared to having to walk to a certain location, and being given a choice of either a) starting 750 feet closer to your target than you otherwise would (similar to starting at a high orbit that puts you closer to your target), or being given a bike that tripled your speed. If the target was 1000 feet away, starting 750 feet closer, and thus reducing your traveling distance to one-quarter of its original value, would be a better option, but if you were trying to get to a target ten miles away, the initial boost of 750 feet would be negligible compared to the lasting benefit of traveling at a faster speed. Of course, I'm nowhere close to being an expert on orbital mechanics, so that's why I'm asking you guys for advice -- after all, I could easily be completely wrong.

There are actually several times on the forums where the devs have stated that interstellar travel will be a part of KSP at some point. I'll try to post links to the actual threads. Whether or not such a feature is planned, it would be interesting to know which planet would be the best to place a refueling station around for interstellar travel. Personally, if Squad implemented interstellar travel, a resource gathering system, and a system to actually build things in orbit/on other planets (and not just assemble pre-made pieces with docking nodes), I'd be overjoyed. KSP is already an amazingly fun game; if those features were implemented, it would be downright addicting... Edit: here's a quote from this (closed) thread -- http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/showthread.php/17209-Interstellar-travel "Other star systems will be added and they won't be random. The reasoning behind this as stated by HarvesteR is that he wants people to be able to have the ability to share a common achievement. "Hey, I just landed on the 2nd planet in System X!" .. "I remember doing that, it was a blast!"" and "FTL is planned, the engine is made, it's just no in-game yet, and other systems will be a part of KSP, not just the Kerbol system" Of course, the devs could change their minds and decide not to implement FTL travel or interstellar travel, due to either not having the time (it seems like they must be pretty busy as-is just working on all of the other improvements that will be made), or issues with lag/time required to get from point A to B. I do hope they actually DO implement interstellar travel, though.

Since apparently KSP will include interstellar travel in later versions, I was thinking about setting up a refueling base to act as a stop-off point for interstellar ships. So, in order to reduce the amount of delta-V required to get from the Kerbol system to whatever system(s) will be implemented in future KSP versions, would it be best to set up a refueling station around... -- Moho, to maximize the Oberth effect by burning close to Kerbol, or... -- Eeloo, to provide a very high starting orbit (and thus reduce the dV required to leave Kerbol's SOI) Or would it be better to place it around one of the planets between the two, to provide a combination of the two effects? For example, one could say that Eve might be the best, because you get the second greatest benefit from the Oberth effect, while starting from a slightly higher orbit than Moho. So, which do you think would be the best location for a refueling station/jumping off point -- a planet where the Oberth effect can be maximized, a planet with a high starting orbit, or some combination thereof? In this case, assume that the method used for interstellar travel is similar to that used for KSP interplanetary travel -- you have to burn all the way to the other star system (in other words, you don't just have to burn to Kerbol escape, then get insta-transported to the other star system via loading screen).