Diodon

Edit1: Jeb survived this ordeal... albeit with a splitting headache and a cracked helmet. Edit2: The 'ship' referred to in the dialog had long since safely landed. It was supposed to be an unmanned rescue ship, but Jeb boarded it for launch anyway. The stranded kerbonaut was rescued and Jeb was left to his own devices for the return trip.

Ooh, I do like that! I'd eventually like to set up a base on Laythe that can support itself like that. For as long as I've been playing KSP I've actually yet to visit another planet so I'm working on visiting Duna tonight. If that goes well I may try employing some of these techniques.

Yea, I caught that and found it to be rather ingenious! I think the claw is one of the most versatile parts in all of KSP. I've been experimenting with how far you can push it for connecting things myself: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/91948-Is-it-Possible-to-Link-Three-Asteroids-in-a-Triangle/page2#14

Amazing! I always love seeing what people can do with the stock parts. I can never seem to make anything look the way I want with regards to rover design. The rules for how things can attach to each other always winds up foiling my plans or I end up wanting to change a part that is buried. I'm kind of curious if the orange tanker would be able to dock to something properly if it had a docking part on the back. Be neat to use it or a similar design to transport fuel to a pickup craft for that Kethane mod I've been meaning to try.

Yes! With claws only! It is complete! It's remarkably stable... until you make the final attachment, then it comes to life in a terrifying way to rival that ship from Event Horizon. At first it just starts slowly rotating... then undulating. All of which are fascinating until you realize the scale of the thing! Unclamping the various service craft I used to assemble it calmed the beast but returning to it from the tracking station or, god forbid, time-warping lead invariably to a cascading resonance that in mere moments leads horrifying events of catastrophic proportions! Key features of the event typically involve rapid bending, stretching, breaking, violent explosions, and three enormous rocks cast randomly into new orbits (one hopes). I nearly gave up trying this because of how hard it was to maneuver the third asteroid into position. The final linkage to create the loop is achieved by unlocking a joint and applying thrust. Compounding my difficulties was the severe slowdown I experienced which was only partly mitigated by removing all but essential craft and components. I am largely confident that any other configuration would have been fine except for one that involves a loop. I can provide additional images if anyone has interest. Edit: I should clarify that those 'claw strut' assemblies use four docking ports each simply to allow the tug to grab them for installation. The ends of the 6 way connector in line with the claw struts are normal attachments, not docking attachments. The ship in the lower left is one of the refuelable asteroid tugs used to capture, circularize, and bring the inclination to 0 degrees. Barely visible in the top right is a fourth claw strut I brought as a spare and for symmetry on the lifting craft. Jeb is piloting the small tug used to move the struts and is attached to the extra strut at the moment. The lower left asteroid is also covered in RCS pods as it was the final asteroid moved into place.

Was up late last night testing this with the three class C asteroids I collected. Each 'strut' was laid out like X==+==X where 'X' is a grabber, '=' is a structural fuselage, and '+' is a 6-way connector. The remaining ports on the 6-way were docking ports used by a tug ship to position the strut assembly. I managed to connect two asteroids and place two more struts to accept the third asteroid. I was just about to run out of RCS fuel when the asteroid finally reached the assembly... at which point the game crashed. I'll re-attempt after I implement a better asteroid RCS strategy.

Thanks for the heads up! Yea, I'll definitely be doing a lot of quick-saves though I'll probably add the step of swapping back and forth to another ship periodically to ensure it is stable on load. If things get too unstable I'll just fall back to using a central hub with branches that grab on to the asteroids.

Sweet thanks for the info! Just need to gather one more asteroid! I totally expect that the physics engine could get grumpy with me, though that can be its own fun in KSP no? Heck, if the triangle works I might just try to go for a tetrahedron if I'm feeling particularly masochistic.

Hmm, but in the station example you'll wind up with an even trickier situation. With the grabber you just have to enable it but with docking ports don't you have to target a docking port on a different ship to dock to? How would you be able to dock to a port that is effectively on the same ship? Edit: Thanks M4ck for the feedback!

Lets say you have three asteroids (A, B, C) nearby that you want to bind together in a triangular formation using three spacecraft which each have two advanced grabbing units on either end. I don't see any issue with linking A to B and B to C as well as linking the third spacecraft to C but will it let you also link that craft back to A? Fortunately the AGU has an unlockable pivot so flexibility shouldn't be the issue. Once you reach this point all the parts are essentially treated as a single ship so I'm not sure if the game would let you effectively link a ship to itself to complete the triangle. I'm in the process of attempting this, but if someone knows that the game engine won't allow it I'd like to plan for a different arrangement.

If you count failed attempts, probably several hours. My first 'dock' was an exhilarating and proud moment... until I realized that the docking ports were of differing sizes. To add insult to injury I accidentally tapped the space bar thus separating my command module. I was about to just abort the flight when I realized that I could make this a rescue mission to practice orbital rendezvous. I EVA'd all three kerbonauts to the incorrectly designed satellite as temporary housing and managed to return to pick them up. I suppose I could have left them in the command module but I wanted to practice EVA as well. Here is the technique that worked for me: I'm not sure how efficient it is compared to other methods but it is the easiest for me to wrap my head around to consistently execute.

Perhaps a better comparison is with Wile E. Coyote except instead of a KIA you see a coyote shaped hole in the ground and instead of rocket debris... actually there is probably rocket debris also. Sure, he'll be healthy in the next scene but for that moment you can feel for his plight even as you laugh at his predicament.

Goes to show my lack of perception, lol. That's great to hear, looking forward to checking that out tonight!

It paints the picture of the utter failure of the mission which is frequently preceded by some comical mishap or rash miscalculation. The mission is over and the player is faced with a scene of burning wreckage, shrapnel falling, wild boosters flying in all directions, and the stark realization that there was in fact a crew in there. It's dark comedy, like the cut-away scene from Family Guy where Elmer Fudd finally kills Bugs Bunny; simultaneously sad and hilarious. Regarding the other replies, I guess I'd just never noticed any correlation. I'll keep an eye out. I try to glance at them from time to time but I'm far to often trying to balance a nearly out of control rocket lol. It's clear my original question about the KIA portraits was a misunderstanding of what the portrait represented. So the portrait just represents who is in that seat of the pod? I had assumed you just saw one portrait for each Kerbonaut throughout the mission.

In a lot of youtube KSP crash videos I see the Kerbonaut portraits go to static with K.I.A. written over it but in all of my crashes the portrait just disappears. Is this something that got removed? It seemed like a humorous way to increase the emotional investment in the game and drive it home to the player that not only was their mission a complete failure but they even failed to protect the brave Kerbonauts who's lives they were entrusted with. On a related note, is there any correlation between the facial animations of the Kerbonauts and what is presently happening with the ship? I'm not always sure what their states of mind are though it does seem like they have a few expressions like wonder and awe, and flat out abject panic and fear. Perhaps I'm just projecting on them and they are always just in varying states of mouths-agape. As the game progresses towards letting you select your crew it would be cool to give them unique personalities that would impact their animated reactions to various mission events, for example; apprehension prior to liftoff or orbital maneuvers, panic from excessive G forces or spinning out, boredom during uneventful stretches of time, and excitement upon arriving at stations/moons/planets.